


Panic attack

by NinjaDino721



Category: Guardians of the Galaxy - All Media Types
Genre: Flashbacks, Panic Attack, Rocket-Centric, Team as Family, lab experiments
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-04
Updated: 2015-06-19
Packaged: 2018-03-21 04:54:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 12
Words: 37,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3678330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NinjaDino721/pseuds/NinjaDino721
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"He thinks I'm just some stupid thing, he does!" Rocket hates being seen as an animal, a monster. But when things go awry, he is thrown into a series of panic attacks revealing a side to the relentless trigger-happy raccoon he had never wanted the others to see. Things can only go downhill from there as Rocket's past is thrust upon him once again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“Are you freaking kidding me?” Peter, aka Star Lord, which was finally beginning to catch on now that he and the other ‘guardians’ had saved the galaxy, shouted. They were back on Xandar following a lead on a man who was apparently building illegal weapons that, according to Nova Prime were powerful enough to destroy entire moons (Although Peter recalled Rocket creating one of those but really, who was keeping track?)  
He had finally pinpointed the location of one of the men and was chasing him through the streets when another one of his goons came out from around a corner, holding a rather large gun in his arms that was pointed straight at the ex-outlaw’s chest. His eyes widened as he skidded to a stop, watching helplessly as the other man kept running flashing him his middle finger as he disappeared around the corner.  
Peter couldn’t help but roll his eyes at the man’s antics, not that it was below him to do the same, in fact, he had flipped of his pursuers many times while in the Ravanger business, but now that he was the one chasing down the criminals, he saw just how childish it actually was in this type of situation.  
His attention was brought back to the second man when he heard the all too familiar click of the large gun as it was loaded and by the strange whirring sound that was now being generated, charged as well, making Peter wonder exactly what type of gun was being aimed at him. He put his arms up, letting the smaller gun in his own hands drop with a loud clang. Unfortunately, the man had no intentions of backing down, and instead rose the large weapon to his eye, aiming it directly at the now worried Peter.  
“Oh come on.” Peter whined to himself, closing his eyes and bracing himself for the impact. This was going to hurt.  
He winced as he heard the gun take fire, sending a massive blast right at… the wall to the left of him. Peter’s eyes flung open. The blast had torn a large smoldering hole in the brick wall. Peter gulped, holding a hand to his chest, just glad that it had missed him entirely. It was strange though, seeing as though the man had obviously had a locked target on him and yet the blast had missed.  
He turned back to the shooter in question, ready to chase him on the getaway, but it seemed as though somebody was already taking care of him. A very small and merciless somebody. “Rocket!” He shouted. The raccoon had the large gun already shattered on the ground and was in the process of tackling the large struggling man, which Peter thought looked hilarious with the major size difference.  
Rocket gave Peter a slight nod and smirked to which Peter rolled his eyes to. “Hey Quill, thought you could use some help.” He said snarkily. “Or did you have this under control?” he stood up and brushed his paw-like hands together, the attacker lying unconsciously on the ground behind him.  
Peter waved his friend off, picking his own Taser gun off of the ground. “Please, I had this totally under control.” He retorted, although they both knew he was lying.  
“Uh huh, sure, that whole quivering in fear thing was working real well.” Rocket murmured, walking over to the discarded weapon and pulling at a few loose wires.  
“It was! It was a distraction tactic… and I was not ‘quivering.’” Rocket only shook his head, pulling at another wire. Peter leaned over, cocking his head at the sight. Sure he had his fair share of knowledge when it came to using weapons, but when mechanics were involved it seemed that the whole team of guardians took a step back to allow Rocket his space. “What is that?” He asked, curiosity finally getting the best of him.  
Rocket didn’t look up. “Well it’s obviously a gun.” He said. Peter crossed his arms, ignoring the sarcasm.  
“I mean what was it meant for? If he only wanted to get me out of the way the gun didn’t have to be that big or high tech.” He explained, watching as the curious raccoon pulled at another wire, this time dislodging it from its secure position.  
He eyed the copper fibers before finally looking up to meet Peter’s gaze. It took all of the man’s power not to immediately crouch down. He knew how much Rocket hated being treated as an animal, and somehow acknowledging the rather large height difference between the two annoyed him to no end. Peter had learned that the hard way when he had been trying to calm his colleague down on the ship one day and ended up with a black eye the next.  
“It’s wiring is more complicated than any gun I’ve ever seen but it definitely isn’t powerful enough to take out an entire moon.” He said as-a-matter-of-factly. “Let’s get it back to the ship, I can get a better look at it there.” He said, attempting to gather the massive weapon in his small arms.  
“Here.” Peter offered, grabbing the gun from Rocket, ignoring the glare that the raccoon shot back at him, although he didn’t really put up much of a fight, knowing that he wouldn’t have been able to carry the jumbled thing anyhow.  
Peter turned around, heading back up the alleyway that he had chased the first man into. He frowned at the thought of having lost his lead to the base that these so called terrorists were building their weapons at. But at least they did have one of their guns as evidence, or whatever Rocket was planning on doing with it. Peter prayed that the small techno-genius wouldn’t try to construct another bomb out of the materials, one explosion was enough for one lifetime, he was just glad that the ship hadn’t been permanently damaged by Rocket’s stray grenade.  
He was about to ask the raccoon exactly what he was planning on doing with the apprehended weapon when a sudden high pitched yelp caught his attention.  
Peter whirled around to find that his smaller colleague hadn’t been following him, in fact, he was still next to the unconscious man, well at least he used to be unconscious. He was standing upright now, something small and furry in his meaty hands. “Rocket!” Peter yelled in alarm, turning on his heel and sprinting back to the scene at hand, dropping the heap of metal and wires in the process.  
The man had the raccoon in a grip around the ring-tail’s small neck and was saying something to him in a voice too quiet for Peter to understand, or maybe the rapid beating of his heart sounding in his ears was just too loud to hear over.  
Rocket squirmed wildly in the man’s grasp, raising his legs up to kick the beefy arm and his clawed hands to try and pry off the hands clasped around him. The attacker’s hand was covered in countless scrapes and was beginning to drip blood, but he made no motion to let go of the creature anytime soon.  
“Hey!” Peter cried, finally grasping the crazed man’s attention. Rocket turned his head as much as he could, his eyes wide and pleading. Peter’s teeth were clenched tightly and pure adrenaline was coursing through his veins as a wave of anger and panic come over him. He didn’t even realize he had pulled out his Taser gun until the large man let out a cry of pain as the electricity coursed through his body.  
Rocket was dropped instantly in a heap on the ground and Peter let out a sigh of relief when he heard the ring-tail take a gaping breath. He didn’t take his eyes off of the attacker though, keeping his finger on the trigger of his gun and using his other hand to turn up the settings.  
“Nothing can save you rat!” the man shouted, not even giving Peter a glance as he stumbled forward again. The older guardian glared at the man furiously when he saw Rocket flinch out of the corner of his eye. “I found ya once and I can find ya again freak!” The man laughed as Peter pulled the trigger again. The man collapsed on the ground, taking raspy breaths. “You’re dea-“ He never managed to finish his sentence as Peter pulled the trigger again, watching as the crazed attacker writhed in pain before finally passing out.  
Peter glared angrily at the man, kicking him in the side to assure his unconsciousness before Tasing him again.  
A quiet whimper brought Peter out of his rage. And his attention was instantly brought back to Rocket. Whirling around he ran to his friend’s side, horrified at what he saw. Rocket was hunched over on his knees, curled up in on himself, his arms hugging each other so tightly that the claws were drawing blood that seeped through his course fur that was now standing on end.  
But what had Peter worried the most was how violently his friend was shaking. He had never seen Rocket so vulnerable before. Sure he had cried when Groot had ‘died’ but that was something else entirely, he had lost someone, most likely his only friend before meeting the other guardians of the galaxy and by far the closest to him. But this, this was horrifying, seeing the usually proud, gun-happy Rocket reduced to a shaking ball of fur in an alleyway. He didn’t know what to do, let alone what had gotten him so worked up in the first place. He had been attacked before in far worse situations, so why was this so different?  
Nevertheless, peter kneeled down by his friend, holding a tentative hand over Rocket’s quivering body before finally bringing it down on his small shoulder. Rocket reacted instantly, his head shooting up. Peter had expected the raccoon to slap his hand away, he had never been one for physical contact, but what he hadn’t been expecting was for the panicking creature to lash out his claws, scraping three long cuts down Quill’s wrist.  
“Ow!” He shouted instinctively, pulling his arm back. “Rocket what the hell!” He pressed a hand to his wound, it really stung. But Rocket didn’t respond, in fact, he was no longer next to Quill’s side but pressed up against the wall. “Rocket?” He asked warily. The raccoon refused to calm down, his chest heaving as he practically gasped for air.  
Peter felt guilty instantly for yelling at Rocket, it had only made the ring-tail’s condition worse. Upon closer inspection Peter noticed that Rocket’s gaze wasn’t even focused on anything at this point, let alone him, in fact, Rocket’s gaze was flickering to everything but Peter as though searching for an escape, as though he didn’t even see Peter there in front of him.  
“Hey.” Peter said, making sure to use a quieter tone this time. He waved his hands in front of Rocket, trying to get the raccoon’s attention, but to no avail, Rocket seemed as though he were in an entirely different reality, his eyes glazed over and… was he crying?  
“Rocket, come on, come back to me buddy.” Peter pleaded, grasping Rocket’s small shoulders, making sure not to get himself scratched again. Rocket let out a panicked yelp before finally meeting Peter’s eyes. He blinked a couple times, clearing away the dazed look. His breathing began to calm instantly as Rocket glanced around in a confused haste.  
“Quill?” he asked, furrowing his brow upon seeing the man’s hands around him. He wriggled out of Peter’s grasp instantly. “What the hell man? What are you doing?” He said defensively.  
Peter let out a sigh of relief upon seeing that his swearing and defensive Rocket was back. “You don’t remember?” He asked, standing back up to full height upon seeing Rocket’s death glare, ignoring the raccoon as he flinched back a bit.  
“Of course I remember you dolt! I just got strangled by a freakin gorilla!” Rocket retorted, crossing his arms furiously. “Now are we gonna get this thing back to the ship or not?” he asked, gesturing to the mangled and recently discarded gun.  
Peter frowned at the sudden subject change. “Rocket.” He said, not moving from his position. The raccoon made no move to turn around, still acting as though nothing had just happened. “Rocket.” He said again, this time much more sternly. This time he saw Rocket stiffen.  
“What do you want?” He practically snarled.  
Peter made his way over to Rocket so that he was standing in front of him again and not staring at his back. “I want to know what just happened back there.” He demanded.  
“Nothing.”  
“Really, because that didn’t look like ‘nothing’ to me.” Peter retorted.  
Rocket didn’t answer, in fact, he wasn’t even looking at him and instead was prodding the weapon’s wires again. Peter let out an exasperated breath and bent down to pick up the broken gun, knowing he wasn’t about to get an answer any time soon. He slung the mess of wires and metal over one shoulder and made his way back down the alleyway Rocket padding behind him, neither one saying a word until they finally reached the main road again.  
Peter made to turn the corner again when something caught his pant leg. He turned around to see Rocket, his hand latched to his jeans and a look on his face that peter hadn’t seen on him before, embarrassment. He watched as Rocket unclasped his hand from his pant leg and peered back around the corner to the alley they were just in with a worried glance. “What are we going to do about that guy back there?” He asked almost tentatively, not once looking up to meet Peter’s gaze.  
“I’ve already alerted the Nova Core.” Peter assured him, gesturing to a few blue clad men that were already making their way over towards them. He thrust his thumb back towards the alley and the two men nodded in confirmation.  
Once they were alone again, Peter turned back toward the raccoon. “Rocket.” His head shot up instantly. “What did that guy say to you?” He asked. He knew it couldn’t have been the attack in itself that had scared Rocket so badly seeing as he had seen the small warrior go through far worse.  
Peter’s hopes of knowing died instantly as Rocket defensive side took over. “Hell if I know, Quill. I was being strangled by a mad man, it’s kind of hard to understand what anyone’s sayin when you can’t breathe.” Peter frowned and sighed in defeat. “Listen, Quill, thanks, for getting me out of there, but really, I was just tryin to catch my breath, nothing happened.” He said, taking the lead in front of peter and making his way toward the Milano, Peter in tow.  
Upon arrival back at the ship, Rocket disappeared almost instantly into his and Groot’s own bunker. “What was that about?” Gamora asked in confusion, taking the battered gun from Peter.  
“Nothing, he’s fine.” Peter answered, although his gut was churning with guilt. Rocket was most definitely not fine. And whether he wanted him to or not, Peter was going to fix it.


	2. Chapter 2

Rocket practically slammed the door behind him, latching the lock tightly so that no one would be able to get in. he felt his breathing begin to pick up in speed again and he put a small hand to his chest as though to keep his small rapidly beating heart from leaping out of his body.  
He grasped his head in pain as a sudden flash blinded his sight, sending him back to that horrible place. He shook his head, trying to pull himself back out of the memory, he couldn’t handle another flashback like in the alleyway with Quill. A tightness in his stomach presented itself at the memory.  
Quill had obviously witnessed it, although Rocket didn’t remember him having been there, but then again, he didn’t remember a lot of things after he was thrust forcefully into that flashback. He hadn’t had one in so long, years even. Of course he had the occasional nightmare from which Groot often woke him from, but this?  
He shook his head. It was humiliating, Rocket, the snarky quick thinking and closed off warrior, now reduced to a simple… animal having some weird anxiety attack. He had thrown Quill off for a while by pushing the instance away and pretending like it had never happened, but he knew it wouldn’t be long until he tried bringing it up with Rocket again.  
A shiver ran down his spine upon the thought of the incident in the alleyway. He had sent Quill off with the massive gun, knowing that he would never have been able to pick up the thing, as much as he hated to admit. He had turned to follow him when he felt something pull at his tail. Rocket jumped forward a bit in surprise, only pulling on the sensitive appendage more and sending a sharp pain shooting up his spine.  
Rocket whirled around to see the large man he had just knocked out, or at least he thought he had been knocked out, silently cursing himself for not hitting the man harder. He was about to pry the hand off of him when the grip around his tail tightened. Rocket let out a sharp yelp of pain as another wave of pain ripped through him.  
When he opened his eyes again, he realized that he was no longer on the ground, in fact, he was being held quite a few feet above the familiar pavement, his back paws searching desperately for a sturdy surface. He also noted that the burly man was no longer holding him by the tail, but by the neck which was making breathing quite a task.  
Rocket struggled against the man’s grip, he had gotten out of situations such as this plenty of times, attackers believing they could get away with something because of his size. He lifted a clawed hand and scraped a deep gash into the man’s arm, allowing the blood to flow freely from the wound. But to the raccoon’s surprise, the man didn’t let go, in fact, his grip on Rocket’s small throat became even tighter.  
Rocket felt panic begin to bubble up in his stomach and felt his breathing quicken, his heart pounding at a mile a minute, he tried to take a deep breath but the hands wrapped around his writhing body closed off his air passage.  
The man leaned in closer, bringing the struggling raccoon closer until he was only inches away from his face. He tried pulling away, scraping the attacker’s arms as hard as he possibly could, the man didn’t even flinch. Hot breath ran through Rocket’s fur as he was brought even closer.  
Rocket had told Quill that he hadn’t heard what the man had said to him while in the vice grip so close to losing consciousness, and it was partly true, he had been thrown into such a state of shock and panic that he couldn’t quite make out every word the attacker was saying to him. But he was able to pick up enough bits and pieces to cause the raccoon to start shaking with fear.  
“Little freak… worthless… kill you… no escape…”  
Rocket began struggling harder, wanting nothing more than to get out of the man’s grasp. “Hey!” The grip on his neck loosened enough for him to take a breath. He tried turning his head towards the new voice. Quill was standing here, his glare hard enough to kill.  
Rocket wasn’t exactly sure what had happened after that, but he did recall being suddenly dropped quite unceremoniously onto the hard pavement and his lungs suddenly filling with air. A shiver racked his body, making his hair stand up on end when he heard his attacker shouting at him. “Nothing can save you… find you again freak… you’re dea-“ He flinched violently when the man’s words were cut off by the sound of electricity. Rocket could feel himself shaking now and he was back in the lab, cowering in the corner of his cage. The bars were thick and so close together so that he could hardly reach through them even with his small hands.  
There were sounds of screaming animals, some with human vocal chords such as himself and others completely animalistic. But they still screamed nonetheless. The bottom of the cage was cold and the room he and about a dozen more subjects were in was lit with a harsh white light that made him cringe.  
Rocket heard someone in the brightly lit hallway, walking by the cages that lined the walls, coming closer, closer, until the footsteps stopped at the shivering raccoon’s cage. The figure opened the cage door and Rocket pressed himself back against the wall, trying to disappear into the corner, but the figure’s hands reached into the cage, grabbing him harshly by the shoulders. Rocket lashed out instantly, scraping the figure’s wrist.  
The figure pulled back shouting angrily something that Rocket couldn’t understand, only making the quivering creature cower further into the cage. The figure leaned down again, reaching its hands in more slowly this time, grasping him by the arms so the experiment couldn’t escape.  
No escape no escape no escape…  
The words ran over and over again through Rocket’s mind. He had heard that phrase so many times before. Every time he tried to run, every time he tried to get out of this prison. There was no escape.  
Rocket clutched his head in his hands, running his small fingers through his fur as the memory faded away. “I got out.” He assured himself. “I’m fine, I’m okay.” He kept whispering these phrases, his arms wrapped around his chest as he paced about the room. “I escaped. I escaped.”  
The words twisted in his mind as another memory trying to force its way upon his sanity. “No no no.” He pulled on his fur trying to keep himself sane and in reality. Another flash.  
Cages lined the walls.  
“No.” He began to shake.  
He couldn’t move.  
“No no!”  
All he knew was that his back hurt immensely as the metallic implants were attached to some type of machine.  
“No no no.”  
His hands and feet were pinned down and a harsh light was shining in his eyes making him cringe. He let out a yelp of pain when he felt something prodding at his implants. Over the years of being in the laboratory as an experiment, he had been put through a lot of pain and had learned to block it out until it had passed. But this was different, the implants that were surgically placed into his shoulders had left scars and infection making that spot especially sensitive.  
He tried to turn his head toward where he knew someone was standing. He gasped when a sharp pain ran up his spine and Rocket struggled to escape his restraints as something was attached to his back. He felt a hand grab him and roughly shove him back to his original position while the other hand prodded at his back.  
Rocket grunted in pain opening his eyes to see exactly what it was that was being attached to him. Wires. Lots of thick wires were being connected to his implants. He felt the beating of his small heart pick up at the sight. What were they going to do to him?  
His question was answered almost instantly as the figure behind him finally finished with the wires, walking to the other side of the room behind the experiment. Rocket heard the figure as it began to press buttons at rapid speed making his ears twitch in anxiousness. It wasn’t long before a second sound invaded his thoughts. The sound of something being charged.  
Rocket’s eyes widened in panic and he began struggling furiously against the restraints, only causing the metal to dig into his skin, blood running into the fur on his wrists. The charging sound became louder and he could see the wires attached to him move as the figure began to pick them up, plugging them into the machine behind him.  
“Stop!” The sound bubbled from his throat, he had just barely received his new vocal chords and the strange noise that came from within him made his throat hurt immensely. The figure behind hi made no move to acknowledge him though, still pressing buttons and charging the mysterious machine.  
He made to shout at the figure again in hopes of communicating somehow when he felt the pain. Lots of pain. His mouth snapped shut, biting down on his tongue in the process. He tasted blood but couldn’t move. He was shaking and the pain was everywhere. Electricity, starting at the base of his shoulders and running all through his body.  
A loud noise filled the room and his throat was sore as a scream tore through him.  
There was no escape.  
…  
Groot stared after his friend as the raccoon made a b-line for their bunker, practically slamming the door as he did so. The humanoid looked away from the hallway Rocket had disappeared down and back toward Quill who had walked in with him. He was in the process of assuring Gamora that their smaller comrade was fine. But Groot could plainly see that the man was lying.  
Peter looked up to face Groot, knowing that the wooden man wouldn’t be fooled and gestured toward the direction in which the seemingly disturbed raccoon had taken off. Groot nodded knowingly, standing up from the swivel chair which was quite small in comparison to the eight foot tree man.  
He had finally reached full height again to everyone’s relief. It had taken a few long weeks to gain his full strength but thanks to his fast regeneration abilities, he was practically as good as new. As he stood up, Groot noticed Drax look up at him from cleaning his knife (or what he now called his since he had stolen it) and lowered his brow in confusion. The large man looked between Groot and Quill, knowing that he was obviously missing something but said nothing even as Groot began to walk away.  
Although the group of ‘Guardians,’ as they were called, were now close friends with one another, hell, Groot had even overheard Gamora calling them a family at one point, it was obvious to everyone that there was no closer bond than Groot and Rocket. They were the only two to have been friends before the whole Ronan fiasco and had established their close friendship long ago. Of course the others cared for the raccoon, despite his sarcastic demeanor, but when it came to situations such as this, they all knew to leave Groot to it.  
As he made his way down the corridor of the ship that led to the separate bunkers, Groot couldn’t help but wonder what had made his friend so skittish. He didn’t seem angry in his haste to get past the others and to seclusion, usually Groot could hear spiteful swearing coming from under Rocket’s breath when he was irritated. But he had gone straight to his bunker, not stopping to look at anyone or even give an excuse for why he was in such a hurry as he padded by.  
Groot finally approached the door to his and Rocket’s shared bunker and reached for the handle, only to find that it wouldn’t open. Groot frowned at the metallic handle and pulled on it again, this time harder. Still nothing. Rocket must have locked it. He was about to knock on the door when a sudden shout from the other side of the door made him freeze.  
He stood there for a moment, listening carefully and trying to ignore the constant humming of the ship as it flew. Nothing. The humanoid shook his head, reaching up to knock again. “Please! No!”  
If Groot had any blood running through his body it would have gone cold upon hearing the horrible shout from the other side of the steel door. The tall tree-man didn’t even have time to process exactly what he was doing before his arm practically tore through the thick metal as though it were paper. He retracted the strong vine-like appendage before hitting the slab of metal again and again, he ignored the fact that Peter was going to lose it once he found out what Groot was doing to his ship, the only thing he could possibly focus on right now was the incoherent shouting from his friend inside that room and the fact that the only thing standing between him and Rocket was this damned door.  
Another punch and the door practically flew off of its hinges, crashing loudly to the floor. Groot quickly stepped over the mess and scanned the room in search of Rocket only to see that the raccoon was nowhere to be found.  
Panic began to take over Groot’s actions as he grabbed the blankets of Rocket’s bed, tearing them away from the mattress in search of the missing raccoon. He turned to the other side of the small room towards a jumbled mess of discarded inventions and wires when he heard it, a whimper.  
He turned quickly towards the small noise, the bed. Groot immediately crouched down as low as he could go, peering underneath the raccoon’s sleeping space and into the darkened corner where he found something small and shivering. Wide eyes reflected the light of the room back at him like an animal caught in headlights. Rocket.  
The raccoon was pressed against the wall, tail wrapped around his body as though to create some type of barrier between him and some invisible force. His glowing eyes were wide with panic as they darted about the small space, not once meeting Groot’s gaze.  
The largest guardian felt a wave of worry and concern overcome him and he reached forward toward his friend, opening his large wooden hand towards the shaking animal, trying to calm him down and lure him out from under the bed.  
He was within reach of Rocket, about to gather the panicking creature in his hand when the animal in question was suddenly no longer in front of him. Groot frowned in confusion, retracting his arm to search for the disappeared creature.  
Rocket had leapt away from Groot’s hand and was now pressed into the opposite corner. Groot reached forward again, this time slower with his hand lower to the ground, trying to make himself less threatening, which was quite hard for an eight foot tall alien tree-man.  
He stopped again when Rocket let out an animal-like whimper, sinking further into the shadows under the bed. Groot pulled back, he needed a new tactic and fast. He sat up again and glanced about the room, searching for something that could possibly help him in getting his best friend out from underneath the bed.  
A thought was running through his mind but he feared that the outcome would only make things worse. Another yelp from under the bed and Groot had made his decision, he lifted himself back onto his feet and reached down grasping the metal in his hands. He silently apologized to Rocket before lifting the bedframe off of the floor.  
Rocket’s eyes widened even more than Groot thought was possible as his hiding place was slowly lifted away. The humanoid looked down worriedly at his friend. He had never seen him his way before, or at least not any time recently.  
When the two had first become friends, Rocket had just barely escaped from the lab that he had been created in. In fact, that was how the unlikely friends had met. Groot remembered that day with great fondness, the day he had discovered a family. The day he had promised to himself to protect his trigger-happy comrade.  
And he made sure to keep that promise, whether it meant sacrificing himself to protect the raccoon from a deadly ship crash, or calming him from a nightmare, he would be there for Rocket. He felt a sudden sadness overcome him as he looked down upon the cowering creature, wanting to simply gather him up in his arms with every whimper.  
He leaned down again, having placed the bed sturdily on its side, leaving Rocket with nowhere to hide. Groot felt horrible having to force his friend out of his safe place, but knew it had to be done if he was going to get anywhere near Rocket..  
He crouched down, leaning in closer to the quivering creature. Rocket was shaking uncontrollably, his fur on end and his claws opening and closing as though searching for something to grasp to. Groot held out his hand again, hoping Rocket would realize his gesture of kindness and come out of his state.  
He had no such luck. The moment his hand was within inches of Rocket’s fur, the creature let out a high pitched yelp. Groot pulled back instantly in shock, barely catching the animal as he tried making a break for it, staring at the open doorway longingly. He pulled back on the struggling Rocket, trying to gather him in a comforting embrace, but Rocket would have none of it, scraping his claws against his rough tree bark and reaching out towards the doorway with open hands.  
“No!” Groot glanced back, startled by the sudden shout. “Lemme go!” Rocket shouted, his voice tight as though he were crying. Groot pulled him into his lap, placing a soothing hand on his friend’s head and stroking back slowly. He knew Rocket hated being pet, he wasn’t some stupid animal and he didn’t hesitate to make sure everyone knew, but it seemed to calm the raccoon down immensely.  
It took a few minutes for Rocket’s breathing to finally slow down as he looked about the room. His eyes were focused again but still wide with fear. Groot watched as Rocket took in his surroundings, having to hold in a chuckle when he saw his look of confusion upon seeing the torn down door and flipped bed.  
“Groot?” Rocket asked, his voice wavering.  
Groot looked down, his hand still absentmindedly stroking Rocket’s fur. He didn’t seem to mind though, in fact, the raccoon seemed in need of the physical contact, leaning in slightly as the large wooden hand touched his head. It was times like these when Rocket was grateful for his connection with Groot. He wasn’t the touchy feely type person and everyone knew it. But even the sarcastic bounty hunter needed someone to turn to, and he was glad to say that for him, it was Groot standing by his side.  
“I am Groot.” The humanoid responded, his low voice rumbling throughout his wooden structure.  
Rocket curled up in Groot’s grasp, allowing a tear to finally escape from his eyes and drip onto the floor. “What’s happening to me?”


	3. Chapter 3

Drax let out a bored sigh as he ran the tattered rag over his knife again. He had been assigned to monitoring the ship for the night to make sure they weren’t attacked of knocked of course for whatever reason and he hated it. He was tired and fairly bored to say the least.  
It had only been a matter of hours, but the lack of movement about the ship was quite unnerving, especially when you’re used to having to worry constantly about one of Rocket’s machine’s blowing up or Gamora trying to snap your arm at any moment.  
He looked up from his knife to face the window of the ship, trying to find something to distract him from his boredom. He stared through the clear glass for a few moments, searching for something, anything even slightly amusing before flopping back in his seat. Nothing but empty space.  
He sat there for a few minutes, thinking of his different options. He could clean his knife, look through the window, or clean his knife again. Drax shook his head and let out a heavy grunt as he stood up from his seat. A walk around the ship would do him some good, and besides, he could have used a drink right about now anyhow.  
After taking one last look toward the window, making sure there really was nothing harmful in the ship’s course, Drax took his leave towards the small kitchen area where he knew Quill kept his alcoholic beverages. He wasn’t one for being drunk, he had remembered what had happened last time he had been intoxicated back on Knowhere, having gotten into a bar fight with both Groot and Rocket, almost getting blasted by the creature’s gun had Quill not intervened in time. But he found that the foul smelling liquid did take the edge off every once and a while and at this point, he was desperately looking for something to occupy himself with.  
He pushed the door of the kitchen open, careful to not step on any of the discarded weapons or plans drawn up by the animal in question. Out of all of his new found friends, Rocket himself was the most mysterious and well-guarded. Of course, the others had their secrets too, even if they were now considered friends or, dare he say it, family, not everyone was ready to pour their soul out like Drax had. His kind was unknown to the sarcasm and what Quill had called metaphors, although he was beginning to get the hang of the concept in itself, but Drax was also not one to keep his emotions to himself, believing that everyone ought to understand exactly what was happening with the large man as he did.  
They all knew of his family before the guardians and exactly what had happened to them. He didn’t see the point in secrets, he found them rather troublesome and they almost always got in the way one way or another.  
But although the other’s had their personal histories, Drax found it rather easy to piece together everyone’s pasts. For instance, Peter’s mobile music device was obviously given to him by someone close, and by the way he spoke of his mother, he could only guess that it had been passed down from her.  
Gamora was another story. Despite the fact that she had began as his least favorite comrade, being in allegiance with his family’s killer, he had actually found her rather good company at times. She had also lost her family to Thanos, but was tortured afterwards, turned into some sort of living weapon and a fairly closed off assassin. But Drax had soon come to realize that even though the green woman wasn’t one to share her past, she desperately wanted to. She wanted to pour her heart and soul out, but her past conditioning by Thanos had deprived her of the ability to, leaving the poor woman with nothing but her instinct to destroy.  
Groot in himself was an open book. Even though only his smaller friend had the ability to understand his speech, the humanoid was still quite easy to understand, as though the creature didn’t need to speak to be heard. He was friendly to everyone despite their differences such as when he had pulled Drax from his death of drowning on Knowhere after his horrible mistake, and his loyalty was by far his best aspect. But it was obvious that despite his kind nature, Groot would stop at nothing to protect his closest companion, Rocket.  
Drax shook his head at the thought of the small ring-tailed creature. The way he had stormed in earlier that day. He knew he wasn’t the only one that had noticed that Rocket was on edge. In fact, he had almost followed Groot when their smaller comrade had practically ran to his private quarters, but had decided against it.  
He knew that despite the bond between the five guardians, Rocket was by far the most secretive, especially toward him. Drax knew the raccoon wasn’t his closest friend, and he knew why too, the weight of that guilt piling up on his every time his comrade refused to hold a conversation with him or even go on a simple mission with the burly man.  
“I didn’t ask to be made! I didn’t ask to be torn apart and put back together over and over, turn into some little… monster.”  
The words still haunted Drax to that day. He knew nothing of the creature’s past before that day. And still knew little of it now besides the fact that the poor animal had obviously had spent part of his life in some sort of torturous science facility.  
He also hated himself for his unfamiliarity to the concept of ‘shutting up,’ as Quill had called it. Being a fairly outspoken species, Drax wasn’t quite accustomed to not speaking his mind. He now knew to think before calling Rocket ‘rodent’ or ‘vermin’ knowing now that the titles were harmful to his friend. He was truly getting the hang of the concept, although the words did end up slipping out during times of anger or confusion and he always regretted them instantly upon seeing the creature’s eyes widen in hurt before his defensive mechanism took over, which usually meant pulling out a gun.  
Drax frowned upon the thought, reaching for some of the clear bottled liquid ‘hidden’ in the top shelf when an unfamiliar sound made him freeze. He retracted his muscular arm, looking over his shoulder to listen for the noise again… Nothing.  
The man pressed his lips into a fine line, he could have sworn that he had heard something. He pulled down the bottle and made his way back to the front of the ship to clean his knife, or stare out the window, or maybe he would just clean his knife again. He unscrewed the cap and took a swig of the foul liquid, cringing at the taste. He didn’t know what the appeal to the drink was, but at least it took his mind off of his guilt fueled thoughts.  
That is until he heard the noise again, making him almost drop the bottle in surprise, dripping splotches of the burning drink onto his bare chest. He ignored the cold liquid as he turned away from control panel of the ship, placing the bottle on the table covered in scattered papers and machinery.  
Walking back towards the corridor of the ship that linked to the guardians’ rooms, Drax listened carefully, trying to pin point exactly where the noise was coming from. “No, stop! Please!” Drax practically took off down the hallway upon hearing the voice shouting, although he didn’t understand exactly what was happening.  
The voice obviously belonged to Rocket, had he already made Gamora angry at this time of day? No, the creature was far too proud to plead at the hands of any of his companions. Had someone else gotten aboard the ship whilst he had gone to get a drink? Quill was going to kill him.  
Drax veered around the corner, his feet sounding loudly off the metallic floor until he made his way to the furthest room. He reached out to grasp the handle and open the door to his friend’s room when he realized that there was no handle. In fact, there wasn’t even a door.  
The man furrowed his brow, staring in confusion at the mangled slab of steel lying on the floor of both Groot and Rocket’s bedroom floor. It looked as though it had been run through with some sort of pole, although upon further inspection it could have very possibly been the incredibly strong and indestructible arm of a certain wooden creature.  
Groot was standing in the corner of the room, his arms wrapped around himself like a cocoon and laced to the walls to keep the massive alien upright. Drax stepped over the distorted metal slab and into the small room. There was no one in there besides Groot, Rocket, and himself. In fact, the raccoon in question was asleep on a slightly bent bed. Drax could only suppose that it too had been the work of the sleeping tree man in the opposite corner of the darkened room.  
So what had happened? Had he simply imagined the noise out of pure boredom and paranoia? No, it had definitely been Rocket’s shouting that had grabbed his attention. But why? Drax stared down at the sleeping creature and noticed something was off about his slumbering companion. He was shaking. Quite vigorously too.  
Drax looked up towards Groot, tapping the slumbering tree on the wooden shoulder. “Groot.” He whispered, trying to wake him, up. The tree man did nothing to acknowledge his presence, and for a reason too. The poor creature had just recently reacquired his full form and he still needed a massive amount of energy to keep up with his massive growth. Drax knew that he wouldn’t be waking his friend any time soon. Which left Rocket’s predicament up to him.  
“Small friend?” Drax whispered, placing a hand on the ring-tail’s shoulder, which, with his massive hands and Rocket’s small body, meant the raccoon’s entire back.  
Rocket reacted instantly, slashing at Drax with is clawed hands. He pulled back instantly, a small stream of blood beginning to form and drip down is massive arm. His brow drew low in confusion, Rocket’s eye’s remained closed, he was still sleeping and yet he had attacked Drax.  
“Rocket.” He said, this time in a louder voice. He realized that this was the first time he had actually addressed the raccoon by his actual name and not simply friend or some type of derogatory term that he was trying so hard to stop using. The small guardian’s breathing began to pick up pace and his eyes screwed tightly, his little hands grasping at the blankets as though he were holding himself away from something.  
“Rocket.” Drax tried again, reaching out again to shake the animal awake.  
“No!” Rocket’s back arched as though he were in immense pain, his hands and feet still clung to the mattress unmoving almost as if they were tethered down.  
Drax stared back in horror. He had never seen Rocket like this. His angry and rather destructive friend was now having a nightmare? The shaking didn’t stop and neither did the tears that were beginning to seep into his fur. The man looked at him in shock. He had only seen the creature cry at one moment and that was when he had thought Groot had left them forever.  
He remembered how he had comforted the raccoon that fateful day, stroking his head as he would a house pet, although he knew he’d be killed the instant he even thought of the defensive creature that way. But now… he just looked so helpless as he twisted and turned in his sleep, small mumbles of ‘please’ and ‘stop’s seeping through his clenched teeth.  
“Rocket, please. It is only a dream.” Drax tried reasoning, shaking the creature again, but Rocket only arched his back more and threw his head back before letting out an ear splitting shriek.  
To say that Drax was surprised was an understatement. He was horrified. Seeing the poor quivering animal in so much pain, he felt his heart clench when the screaming didn’t stop, only pausing for moments at a time for the creature to take a few gasping breaths before crying out in anguish once again.  
And before he knew it, Rocket was lifted into Drax’s arms as he tried to calm his panicking comrade down, petting his ears back in gentle strokes like he had all those weeks ago. The raccoon didn’t stop struggling, but his shouting did die down to a simple yet heart wrenching whimper.  
He heard footsteps running through the hallways as Quill and Gamora approached the bedroom and Groot had finally woken up, standing over his friend with a look of absolute devastation glimmering in his wide eyes.  
“What’s happening?” Gamora asked, staring at both Drax and the still quaking Rocket with fear and confusion. “Is someone hurt?”  
“I knew this wasn’t going to end well.” Drax heard Quill murmur and his head snapped towards the smaller man with a stern look.  
“What do you mean by that?” He asked.  
Quill hadn’t taken his eyes off of the whimpering creature in his arms, a look of worry plastered on his face. “Earlier today. Something happened when Rocket and I were out. I’m not really sure what it was, I hadn’t witnessed the whole thing, but basically, someone attacked him and it was suddenly like he wasn’t even there anymore.” He tried explaining.  
Drax frowned. “This creature can teleport?” He asked, this was news to him.  
Quill’s gaze flickered towards him and he raised a brow in confusion. “Wha- no! It’s a figure of speech. I mean, it was like Rocket couldn’t see me anymore, like he was somewhere else in his own mind.”  
Drax mentally kicked himself for not understanding the metaphor when his thoughts were suddenly cut off by a gasp and a movement in his arms as Rocket bolted upright, clenching his chest where three metal implants jutted out of him as though he were in pain.  
The raccoon’s eyes were open but dazed as he looked about the room in panic before realizing that he wasn’t the only one there and also that he was no longer in his own bed but in something much warmer, and moving. He practically shouted in surprise as he stumbled out of Drax’s hold, pressing himself against his bedframe.  
“What the hell?” He asked, his defensive voice wavering as he rubbed his eyes blearily. “What are you guys doing here? Can’t you let a guy sleep?”  
The others exchanged glances warily. “Well we would if you hadn’t woken us up with all of your shouting.” Gamora stated plainly.  
Rocket stiffened instantly, his small hands grasping at his fur, obviously still on edge. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He mumbled, looking down at the floor as though it suddenly held some sort of interest to him. “Please leave.” His last words came out as more of a whisper.  
“Sorry buddy, but we’re not leaving until we’ve got this whole panic attack thing taken care of, this is the second time today.” Quill said, crossing his arms to make a point.  
Groot grunted behind Drax, holding up a third finger, making Quill’s mouth drop open.  
“Three?”  
Rocket looked up towards his friend with a look of pure betrayal. “I am Groot.” The tall figure stated apologetically, leaning down to put a comforting hand on the creature’s shoulder.  
Rocket only pulled away angrily. “I do not have a problem. I’m perfectly fine!” He seethed, crossing his arms over his chest and turning his gaze back to the floor.  
“Rocket.” Gamora began. “We can help you. We understand-“  
“No you don’t!” Rocket shouted, pointing an accusing finger at the green woman. “You don’t understand anything! And I don’t need you to either. Now please, leave me alone.” He finished, turning around to heave himself back onto his messy bed, laying down so his back was facing the others.  
Quill let out an exasperated sigh. “Fine.” He said, throwing up his arms in defeat.  
“Quill.” Gamora stared after him in shock, he wasn’t usually the type to lose patience so quickly.  
“He doesn’t want our help.” Quill answered back. “I say let him be until he finally learns to trust his own friends.” And with that, the man turned on his heel and headed back to his own chambers, closing the door after him.  
Gamora wasn’t far behind, letting out a small sigh of her own and giving the stubborn raccoon a last glance. Groot stood sadly over his friend, not knowing what to do and Drax took that as his hint to leave.  
He stood up from his position on the floor and made his way to the mangled doorway, pausing at the exit and turning back to face Rocket who was taking quivering breaths as if to keep himself from crying again. “Rocket.” He began, frowning further when he saw the creature stiffen upon the sound of his name, his ears pressing against the back of his head. “You are my friend, and I protect my friends.” He said, looking at Groot who nodded back. “I would like you to know that I will help you and think nothing less of you for it.” Rocket said nothing in return, making Drax turn around sadly, finally taking his leave.  
He was only about three steps away when he heard the most heart breaking sound to ever come from the raccoon. “That’s because there’s nothing less to think of a freak.”


	4. Chapter 4

Rocket growled angrily, pulling on his ears to block out the noise. He opened his eyes to see nothing but the serene darkness of his bedroom, well besides the hallway light that shone through the gaping hole in the wall. Rocket couldn’t remember exactly what had happened, but he was fairly certain that Groot had torn away the locked door while Rocket had been going through his second episode that day.  
He was still turned towards the wall in the same position he had been in since Drax had finally left him and judging by the silence gracing the small room, Rocket could only guess that Groot had gone as well, leaving his friend to himself, clutching his head as though holding together a lump of sand that would otherwise fall apart.  
He knew that there was no one else in the room with him, yet Rocket still couldn’t shake the feeling he was being watched, or more accurately, studied. The raccoon absolutely hated the feeling of being stared at, and unfortunately for him, his physical appearance didn’t exactly blend in with the usual crowd, meaning that he got a lot of unusual looks from bystanders.  
And even though the team was more open minded than those people, he could still feel their eyes on him constantly. He knew that as a creature with fur to cover his small body, Rocket hadn’t really the need to wear clothes. Hell, it wasn’t like the scientists had really given him anything to wear in that blasted lab other than a collar and those godforsaken metal implants that were so graciously given to him with a lovely ‘no return’ policy. But the scars that marred his back and chest only drew more attention than the creature was willing to put up with, so, despite the scratchy fabric rubbing his course fur the wrong way, Rocket made sure to cover up his incisions and any other evidence of his time in that damn prison.  
At least physically.  
Rocket curled in on himself further as the voices of those who tortured him for so long sounded loudly in his head. They’re not real. He reminded himself, gritting his sharp teeth together as a shudder ran up his spine.  
He slowly brought a hand down to rub his neck as it began to itch uncomfortably, the phantom pains of the collar being yanked on so harshly coming back to him.  
“Perfect.” He groaned, barely hearing himself over the other voices in his head, when another sharp pain erupted in between his shoulder blades, almost making him yelp in surprise, but Rocket managed to bite his tongue before the strangled sound could make it out of his throat. The last thing he needed was another intervention with the other guardians about his ‘problem.’  
Well it was a problem, but it sure as hell wasn’t their problem. Rocket thought numbly, wincing as the voices became suddenly louder. He couldn’t understand a word they were saying, but it was sure enough to drive the raccoon insane.  
He wanted to shout at the stupid voices to shut up already, but he knew that would do him little good seeing as the only ones who would end up hearing him were the other guardians, and right now, he wanted to keep under the radar with those four. Quill was already practically breathing down his back and of course Groot wasn’t about to leave the matter alone but Rocket actually hadn’t expected much from Drax and Gamora, which is why he was rather surprised to have woken up from his previous nightmare in none other than Drax’s arms.  
He hated it. All of it. Being stared at, looked down upon, being treated like some kind of little freak. Of course, he was, he knew he was, but it didn’t mean he liked being treated like one. Rocket had put up with enough in his short lifetime to let a few glares from the ‘higher species’ get to him. But it still caused the raccoon to falter every time someone instantly defaulted to rodent or vermin when trying to address him.  
The voices had quieted enough to allow Rocket to raise himself into a sitting position, running his shaking hands through his fur. He winced as the thin fabric of his shirt caught on one of his protruding implants, pulling on the sensitive skin. Cringing when a wave of memories tried to force their way upon him again. Memories of deep voices and electrocution, shouting and needles, blood, the smell of chemicals-  
Rocket shook his head furiously. This wasn’t about to happen again. He looked at the clock hanging on the wall across the room. It had been three hours since his last episode and he hadn’t even tried to fall back asleep, especially with those damned voices ringing in his head, and he certainly didn’t want to risk leaving, afraid he’d end up being trapped in some sort of meeting about his ‘special issue.’  
He scoffed at the thought. Whatever this issue was, he could face alone, he didn’t need the others staring down at him, eyes full of pity. He had worked far too hard to earn his reputation as the weapon addicted uncaring Rocket to lose it now because of a few stupid flashbacks.  
His feet hit the floor and he instantly felt a twinge of unease in his stomach. He really didn’t want to have to face the others. But he knew that the more that he stayed in this blasted room, the more they would worry. It was best to pretend it had never happened, keep them off his back for a little while at least so he could figure things out himself.  
He felt no vibrations from the ship as he made his way through the corridors, which meant that they had landed somewhere for the time being, maybe he would be able to sneak out at some point, get himself a drink, at least that was his plan until he found everybody gathered in the kitchen.  
…  
To say that Gamora was frustrated was the understatement of the year. She was sitting back down in Quill’s makeshift kitchen, a chipped cup filled to the brim with a bitter tasting liquid called coffee in her green hands. She grimaced at the taste, yet still found herself drinking it every morning.  
She leaned forward in her creaky chair and placed the mug down on the cluttered table, having already cleared a designated area of scattered papers and something that looked quite a bit like a bomb, most likely curtesy of the ship’s furry mechanic.  
She ran her slender fingers through her dark hair groaning as a dull pain began to throb in her head. It was still rather early. In fact, after the whole Rocket incident she had never even tried going back to her bedroom, deciding that she wouldn’t be getting much sleep anyhow.  
Drax had since docked the ship onto the nearest planet, a small and rather crowded planet, but it would give the group time to restock the ship and hopefully allow everyone to process exactly what was happening with their furry partner.  
It was obvious that the assassin was not the type to often have a sentimental or otherwise sensitive demeanor, and she didn’t hesitate to show it when Rocket got on her nerves, such as when he left his handheld grenades on the floor for her to trip on in her morning haze (Quill had not taken kindly to having his ship almost destroyed in a stray blast.) But she did, however, care for each of the four other guardians and considered them all to be her family.  
Not that she really had that high of standards for a family seeing as though hers for the majority of her life consisted of being tortured by Thanos and striving to rise above her jealous sister, Nebula. But the band of misfits, as Peter had once called them, was growing closer by the day and the normally relentless warrior found herself growing fonder of them in a way that she couldn’t quite place.  
Out of all of them though, Rocket was the only one who refused to open up to anybody, despite his walking tree friend that is. In fact, she couldn’t think of a time since they had met where Groot had willingly left the small creatures side. Or maybe it was the other way around.  
Rocket was certainly not a social animal, often times wishing to remain on the ship tinkering with his explosives than explore a new planet with the others, unless it involved some type of alcohol, which she wasn’t sure was the best thing for a raccoon to be ingesting, biologically enhanced or not. But he always seemed to be stuck to Groot’s side, whether it be riding on the tall figure’s shoulder or carrying him in a pot, it was the only time Rocket ever really opened up.  
She remembered trying to hold conversations with the small mammal during those long nights when neither of them could sleep, often walking in on him taking apart Quill’s ship and screwing them into one of his many inventions, only to receive a few nervous shrugs or nods in response to her comments. Gamora eventually stopped trying to engage him in conversation during these times, instead deciding to simply watch the small maniac work in a deafening silence.  
It had been one of those silent nights that she had actually taken to think about who Rocket actually was. Peter had been right that day on Yondu’s ship. They were all a bunch of losers. Drax had lost his wife and daughter to Ronan, and he certainly didn’t find the need to hide his intentions against their murderer. Peter himself had lost his whole planet, being abducted at such a young age, and by the sound of it, the same day his mother had died. She herself had even confided in the others of her parent’s deaths at the hands of Thanos. But Rocket…  
She found herself watching the raccoon more closely after that, catching those moments when his lip twitched into a snarl when the locals stared incredulously at the smaller creature. The way he flinched in pain whenever something even touched his back, although she could never place why. But one thing that she found most alerting was how Rocket reacted to his titles.  
Gamora knew she had made the horrible mistake of calling him rodent once or twice before and Drax had fallen into his literal terms of speaking every once and awhile, let it be derogatory or just for speaking to the raccoon. But both had halted instantly upon hearing Rocket’s drunken speech that night on Knowhere.  
She had never thought the aggressive creature could have ever looked so… broken. And really, that was the only word she could use to describe Rocket now as he was left shaking like a scared child in his living quarters after having a panic attack that she hadn’t even thought possible by the otherwise fearless animal.  
“Couldn’t sleep either?”  
Gamora was brought out of her daze upon hearing Peter’s voice as he stepped into the room, looking thoughtfully at her cup of coffee before nodding as though being struck with a sudden idea, making his way over to the half-filled coffee pot.  
She ran her hands through her hair again, twisting the bright ends in between her green fingers before shaking her head. “I’m worried about him Quill.” She admitted solemnly, ignoring the almost shocked expression that Peter gave her from across the kitchen. She wasn’t one to be open with emotions, in fact, she had been raised for most of her life to pretend she didn’t have emotions. But just thinking about that agonizing scream that had initially woken her made her stomach clench in what she could only express as guilt.  
Guilt for not being there, not understanding. Guilt for allowing Rocket to be alone for so long that he no longer thought he could trust anyone to help him, to not see him as the monster she knew he thought he was.  
Peter stood behind her, holding his mug in one hand and running the other through his own hair. Gamora could feel him staring at her but didn’t turn around to face him, she was far too busy staring at the ripples in the dark liquid in front of her as both Drax and Groot made their way into the now crowded room as well.  
“I found myself unable to sleep.” Drax explained, as he pulled out another chair to sit down across from Gamora.  
Peter nodded in agreement. “Welcome to the club buddy.” He said, lifting the bitter drink to his lips.  
Drax furrowed his brow, looking at both Groot and Gamora for an explanation. “Which organization are you referring to?” He finally asked, receiving a stifled laugh from Gamora as Peter tried explaining the figure of speech to the larger man. “I am not fond of these metaphors.” He admitted, rubbing his forehead tiredly, it was obvious no one had gotten any sleep since having been woken up by Rocket’s panic induced yelling.  
A sudden movement from the other side of the room caught Gamora’s attention as Groot made his presence known as well, stepping into the room further, his hands clasped almost sheepishly as he looked up towards Quill, his bright eyes pleading. “I am Groot.” He said somberly.  
Peter pursed his lips and nodded at the humanoid. Only Rocket could actually make sense of Groot’s selective vocabulary, but at that moment, they were all able to figure out exactly what the wooden man was trying to tell them, his wavering voice saying it all.  
“We’re worried too buddy.” Quill assured him, getting a small grunt in reply as Groot looked away sadly. “We’re going to figure this out though right? I mean we’re the Guardians of the freaking Galaxy for goodness sake! I think we can take care of something happening with our own partner right?” He pressed.  
Gamora couldn’t help but smile. Despite her previous views of the wanted thief, it was obvious that Peter was by far the most dedicated of all of them. Not that the others didn’t share in loyalty to their goals. Drax had even called Ronan in determination to avenge his family. But Quill had openly sacrificed himself to not only save his friends from the effects of the infinity stone, but the entire planet of Xandar and more importantly, the galaxy itself, from destruction, knowing full well that he should have died if not for his mysterious father’s origins.  
“Ahem.”  
The four froze instantly, turning towards the doorway to face the raccoon in question. Gamora found herself averting her gaze guiltily, biting her lower lip as Rocket scanned them with a look of anger and dare she say it, embarrassment.  
“Well good morning to you too.” He said begrudgingly when no one decided to speak, making his way into the crowded kitchen area and practically leaping onto the counter for a better view of the limited food choices. He picked up a slightly bruised fruit that they had picked up in Xandar before turning around again, taking a large bite out of the dripping produce.  
No one spoke, sending them all into a rather awkward silence, only broken by Rocket’s chewing and the sound of Quill’s blasted music playing quietly in the background.  
Finally, Gamora felt peter shift behind her, his hands clutching the back of her chair for support. “Um, hey Rocket?” He said hesitantly. The raccoon didn’t respond any more than a side glance as he bit into the fruit again. Peter took this as a sign to continue. “We need to talk.”  
Rocket stiffened visibly, his glare hardening and his jaw beginning to clench. “No thank you.” He responded though gritted teeth. Peter opened his mouth to retort when he was cut off as the raccoon spoke again. “Hey, where are we anyway?” He asked, his aggressive glare sliding away as though the previous conversation had never happened. Gamora silently cursed the creature’s determination as he pushed the problem away once again.  
Quill let out a sigh of exasperation, obviously feeling the same way as Rocket continued to refuse eye contact, staring at the pit of the fruit that now sat in his hands as though it had somehow offended him.  
“We’re some ways off of Xandar.” He explained. “Some planet between there and the Kyln I think.” He explained, Drax hadn’t gone into much detail of where exactly he had landed their ship.  
Rocket nodded, pushing himself off of the counter and landing with a soft thud before making his way back out of the room.  
“Where are you going?” Drax asked the retreating figure.  
The raccoon just waved him off. “Don’t get your panties in a twist sunshine. I’ll be back in a bit.” He shouted back.  
Drax stiffened upon the comment, grasping the arms of his chair with unease. “But I’m not wearing…”  
…  
Rocket let out a sigh of relief as he approached the bustling bar. He needed the time to unwind and hopefully the alcohol would numb the throbbing pain in his head. The voices had all since returned, only blending in with the slurring drunks filling the darkly lit bar.  
He grasped the edge of one of the tattered red stools at the counter, ignoring the man next to him as his eyes practically bulged out of his head with surprise. He hated the reaction but was far too exhausted to deal with it now.  
The orange skinned bartender approached him with interest, offering him some strange drink that Rocket had never heard of before. Or maybe he had, to tell the truth, he couldn’t really make out anything anyone was saying anymore. He simply reached into his trousers, pulling out a few units and tossing them toward the man, smiling in appreciation when a full glass of some blue liquid was placed in front of him.  
Rocket took a long distrustful look at the strangely colored drink before taking a long swig. Deciding that it wasn’t poisonous, he raised the glass to his mouth again only to freeze. The man sitting next to him had yet to stop staring at him and it was becoming quite unnerving.  
The raccoon shifted slightly so that he was facing away from the stranger, hoping he would at some point grow uninterested with the freak in front of him and leave. But he had no such luck. Even with his back facing the figure, he could still feel that gnawing feeling of being watched.  
He was about to get up and chose a different seat when a piercing pain suddenly ran up his spine, causing his back to arch, the drink spilling slightly as Rocket leapt up in surprise. He turned around instantly, trying to find the source of the pain only to find the man next to him staring down at him in awe, his hand still reached out after having prodded at the mammal’s back.  
“What do you think you’re doing?” Rocket shouted, the pain fading into anger. The man just kept staring, his eyes growing even wider as the Raccoon continued talking. “What, you don’t think it’s creepy enough to ogle me like I’m some sort of exhibit? Sorry, but this display is off limits!” He raged on.  
“Still hasn’t healed then?” The man’s voice was somewhat familiar and the words themselves sent shivers throughout Rocket’s body.  
“What are you talking about?” He asked cautiously.  
“Your scars.” He said as-a-matter-of-factly. Rocket took a tentative step back but allowed him to continue. “I’m not surprised really, I told them that those implants were too close to your spinal cord, it’s a wonder we didn’t hit any major nerve endings. It’s nice you see you again though, I can’t say that I haven’t been wondering what became of you after you got out.” He chuckled but his voice was full of regret.  
The glass slipped from Rocket’s shaking hands, shattering the moment it toughed the floor, but everything had gone completely silent in Rocket’s mind. The only thing he could hear now was his racing heart and one single thought. He had to get out of there. He couldn’t go back.


	5. Chapter 5

“No!” His voice was scratchy and garbled, his new ability to vocalize proving more harmful than anything else at the moment but that didn’t stop him from pleading as the white coated scientist wrung his latex gloved hands around his middle, causing the small creature to cry out again in fear. The man showed no intentions of letting go, tugging on the ring-tail’s quivering body harder, tearing its small hands from the bars of its cage that it had been clutching like a lifeline.  
The creature’s heart was beating rapidly and he was practically gasping for air as the metal collar was forced around his neck, his frantic clawing at the band proving useless against the vigorous yanking of the chain against his frail neck. He let out another strangled cry but the figures continued to ignore his warbled yelps as they practically dragged him down the corridor, tearing open old scabs and ripping new wounds into his already red stained neckline.  
A door was thrust open and a harsh blinding light exploded from the room on the other side, momentarily blinding the frantic creature. And when he opened his small brown eyes again, he was being grabbed roughly around the middle once again before the familiar and bone chilling touch of the metal operation table met the sensitive skin of his small hands.  
The panic only grew from there. He had been placed on his stomach, his head twisted uncomfortably to the side as firm hands held down his writhing body from escape. Because there was no escape.  
No escape.  
No way out.  
At least that’s what he had learned over the years. Every time he bit, scraped, ran. He was always caught. Always subdued by another tranquilizer as the long needle was pressed forcefully into his skin until eventually he just stopped trying. Stopped running.  
Unfortunately for the poor creature, his compliance did little to stop the painful experiments. They very rarely ever put him out for the tests. Anesthetics were expensive and would only alert the authorities of their illegal work. They never seemed to mind his pleads and crying, although he often found himself with some plastic plate in his mouth to keep himself from biting down on his tongue, not that it wasn’t torn to shreds already by his sharp teeth, otherwise muffling his strangled screaming.  
Larger hands wrestled down his own as he tried desperately to pull away from the metal restraints on the table while another figure carried over a bundle of neatly wound wires. The small creature only struggled further upon seeing the chords, as though scalpels and needles weren’t enough torture, they had taken to electrocution as of late, tampering with the implants on his back and chest. He didn’t know their purpose, only that it hurt.  
“No! NO!” He shouted again, snapping at the hands that held the small plastic guard for his mouth. He writhed again, managing to gain back one of his paws and clutching it tightly to his body as of not to lose it again.  
He heard one of the figures let out a long sigh before trying to wrestle the arm back into place. “Remind me again why we gave you new vocal chords.” The voice muttered. A firm hand presses on his back and the small creature let out a stifled shout as the pain coursed up his spine, the figure took advantage of the ring-tail’s pain and wrangled the arm back into place, cuffing it firmly to the steel table.  
“Don’t do that!” Another voice called back, but the injured animal couldn’t turn enough to see them. “Those prongs are directly connected to his spinal cord, you damage that, you might damage the brain stem.” The voice finished. The man holding him down only shook his head though before finally letting go of the writhing creature’s back, allowing him to take a gasping breath.  
The creature felt his other arm being pulled away against his will towards the second restraint when the room jolted to one side, sending a few syringes and some other supplies clattering to the floor and he suddenly found that he once again had control of the appendage. Without thinking twice about it, the small animal pulled the arm in again, grasping his fur to keep from losing it again when he realized that there was no longer any hands trying to grasp it back.  
The pressure on his midsection had lightened substantially as the scientists began to look around nervously. “What was that?” One of the figures finally asked, his brow drawn with confusion. The others exchanged a few wary glances before shrugging.  
“Earthquake?” One suggested, her hold on the animal still struggling on the table growing firm again, forcing the air out of the creatures small lungs. The others seemed to think on the explanation before turning back toward their cowering experiment.  
Boom!  
Another blast shook the room, this one more forceful than the last and the hands holding the creature down were removed entirely. “What’s happening?” A figure shouted angrily, striding to the other side of the room and pulling open the doors. The creature had yet to get up from his position in fear of reminding the remaining scientists their original task but the muffled profanity from the man at the door alerted him that whatever was out there wasn’t good.  
“It’s Nova.” He seethed, practically tearing his lab coat off and heading towards the second exit that led to the other testing rooms.  
The other figures fell into a sudden state of panic, grasping their heads in their hands and following suit. “What do we do with this?” One of them asked frantically, pointing towards the restrained raccoon.  
“Grab it, we can’t have it falling into Nova’s hands as evidence.” He shouted back, making his way towards the dissention table and tearing the restraint off of the creature’s small wrist.  
The raccoon didn’t waste a second in lashing out at the men, scraping long claw marks through their lab coats. The one that had been holding him let out a startled shout, dropping him instantly onto the cold floor.  
“Grab it!” The animal heard the other shout, but he was already scrambling to his feet and racing out the double doors. His heart was racing at a mile a minute and he was almost afraid that it would somehow leap out of his small chest, but his legs didn’t stop moving as he ran through the white-walled hallways, ducking under other frantic scientists and dodging their hands as they reached down to grab him, but he was far too quick.  
Freedom.  
Escape.  
His mind couldn’t quite grasp the concept yet, still worried this was all some sort of test to see just how well he could strategize his escape, yet he continued to run. That is until he found himself facing another predicament. The creature skidded to a halt as he veered around the corner, almost crashing head on into the man’s blue clad leg.  
He scrambled back, staring up fearfully when the man turned around, holding some sort of weapon in his hands that was now pointed directly at the raccoon. The animal closed his eyes tightly, awaiting the electric pulses run through his body, but it never came. In fact, the figure had dropped the gun entirely so that it now hung loosely at his side.  
“Hey.” The voice was surprisingly calm and the animal slowly unclenched his eyes, looking up shakily as the man began to crouch down.  
Trap.  
His eyes widened and he reared back towards the wall to avoid being grabbed again. He was so close and he wasn’t about to allow himself to be caught yet. He awaited for the man to lunge, ready to leap away and take off down the maze of hallways again, but the figure didn’t move from his position, simply holding out a hand calmly, as if waiting for the creature’s approach.  
The raccoon only bared his sharp teeth, wanting nothing other than for the man to move out of his way so he could complete his escape. The man pulled back his hand, realizing that the untrusting animal wasn’t about to comply.  
The Nova Corps had been alerted of an illegal facility somewhere near Xandar, reported to have been experimenting on animals, but he hadn’t been prepared to come face to face with the frightened raccoon. His eyes scanned the creature, it was fairly skinny and its course fur was missing in certain areas, but what caught his attention was the three mental implants sticking out of his heaving chest.  
“Did they do this to you?” He asked, knowing that the poor animal probably couldn’t understand a word of what he was saying, but he found himself almost falling over when its hand raised up to feel the three prongs uneasily before nodding back at him and turning around slowly, showing three more implants on the creature’s scarred back.  
The Nova officer felt sick to his stomach at the thought of the pain that the creature must have been feeling. But it could understand him, which meant that there was a possibility of getting through to it his intentions.  
He put a hand to his own chest, gesturing to himself. “I’m not going to hurt you.” He said clearly, cringing as the animal’s eyes squinted with unease. “We’re here to get you out.”  
The creature’s aggressiveness dropped almost instantly upon hearing the phrase. “Escape?”  
The Nova officer stumbled back in surprise. It could speak. He cleared his throat and shook his head, trying to regain his composure as the raccoon took a tentative step closer. He nodded frantically, and the animal’s eyes widened with what he could only place as hope. “You’re escaping today.” He said, reaching out to pick the animal up and take him back to the Nova ship when a searing pain raced up his spine.  
The raccoon stood there in shock as the man clutched his chest and fell to the floor, blood starting to pool around him from the bullet wound. The scientist holding the gun behind him gritted his teeth and aimed the weapon towards the animal. “Come with me, and no one else gets hurt.” He said, gesturing towards the fallen man sprawled on the ground.  
The raccoon stared at the fallen man in astonishment. “Escape.” He managed, grasping the blue man with all his might, ignoring the blood that was now covering his feet and fur. He couldn’t go back. Not now.  
“There is no escape!” The scientist shouted back, clicking the gun and coming closer to the experiment, making to grab him.  
The creature reared back, still holding the arm of his fallen savior, eyes scanning frantically for anything, anything that could save him. Then he saw it. The discarded pistol at the dying man’s side, the one he had dropped to care for the animal before he had been shot.  
The Scientist moved steadily towards him, one hand outstretched to grasp the being’s tail when a deafening shot shook the walls and there was suddenly a second body at the raccoon’s side, jolting and writhing in pain as electricity shot through him before he froze, his eyes open and staring blankly into the animal’s eyes, sending a chill up its spine.  
He was dead.  
He had killed somebody.  
The sound of shoes against the hard floors shook the creature out of his thoughts. There were more coming. More scientists, saviors. He wasn’t sure which, but he did know that he didn’t want to go through that experience again. He tore his gaze away from the haunted eyes of the man who had once tortured him. But not anymore. He was getting out. He was going to escape.  
…  
Rocket’s breathing had quickened again as he blinked away the memory, his shaky claws tearing holes in his shirt nervously. He felt around uneasily to find that he had yet to strap any sort of weapon to his back before he had left. A step that he made sure never to miss… at least until today. Just his luck.  
He clenched his jaw tightly and bared his teeth at the man sitting in front of him before practically launching himself off of the bar stool and racing on all fours towards the exit. He only stopped when a large weight came down upon that one useless appendage that he found himself constantly wishing he never had, his tail.  
An animal like yelp tore itself from his throat as he whirled around towards the large reptilian alien that had stepped on him in his haste, ready to begin a serious bar fight seeing as though he was most definitely in the mood for it, but another presence caught him off guard. The former scientist had left his seat and was slowly making his way over to where Rocket was sitting, holding his ringed tail for dear life.  
“Please, I-“ The man began to reach out as though to help him up, but Rocket lashed out with a clawed hand, stumbling back when a white flash blinded him. No. No no no.  
He clutched his head in his hands and pulled tightly at the fur. “Not now.” He whispered to himself as another flash of syringes and scalpels blurred across his vision.  
The man in front of him stared down in what could almost have been mistaken as confusion and sympathy. But Rocket knew better, especially when that blinding flash suddenly transformed that man’s clothes into the all too familiar stark white lab coat. He saw a hand reach tentatively toward him and he lashed at it again. “Don’t touch me!” He cried, almost falling back on himself as he searched again for the open doorway frantically, blinking rapidly to clear his vision again.  
Upon finally spotting his escape route, the panicking raccoon was back on his feet in an instant and taking off back towards the open air, making sure to dodge the feet of the other larger drinkers. He was outside now and in his panicked state, Rocket couldn’t even fathom what he was supposed to do next.  
Where was he supposed to go?  
Home? He couldn’t think straight.  
Did he even have a home?  
The Milano! His ship.  
Where was it?  
Left? Right?  
Did they leave him?  
No!  
His mind was racing at a mile a minute and the loud pounding of his heart wasn’t making his thoughts any clearer as his eyes flickered from side to side, trying to remember which way he had come from.  
“Wait!”  
His breath hitched in his throat upon hearing the scientist’s voice. He couldn’t go back. He didn’t even realize that he was running again until he found himself veering around the corner of the bar into a darkened alleyway and pressing himself up against the brick wall, praying that if he just closed his eyes it would all just go away.  
But he had no such luck.  
“Please, I’m not going to hurt you.” The voice called, somewhat calm, yet Rocket refused to let down his guard.  
“Leave me alone.” He said through gasping breaths. His eyes were still closed as he tried to calm himself down, his shaking form refusing to comply and his fingers carving claw marks into the wall behind him.  
“I just wanted to-“  
Rocket’s eyes snapped open, rage coursing through every vein in his body. “I’m not going back!” He shouted, staring at the guilty looking man. “You can’t make me!”  
“89P-“  
“Shut up! That’s not my name.” He seethed. “Don’t ever call me that!” But the damage was already done. Numbers and letters flying through his mind at rapid pace.  
“Subject 89P13 is ready for operation.” The Scientist with the clipboard said taking one of the metal prongs that had been sitting on the tray into his gloved hand and handed it to another figure standing behind the animal.  
The raccoon stared up pleadingly at the man in front of him. The same man now standing in the alleyway. He opened his mouth to say something, wanting to simply beg the figure to let him go, but he was cut off when a stifled scream tore from him, and then there was nothing except pain.


	6. Chapter 6

“Perfect! Now what?” Quill shouted angrily. Rocket had yet to return from his ‘walk’ and the others were beginning to worry that the aggressive raccoon had somehow gotten himself in trouble… again.  
Drax frowned at peter’s outburst, exchanging a look with Groot, who was standing at the opening of the ship, shuffling his large feet nervously, wanting nothing other than to get off that ship and find his friend. “Can we not simply go out and get him?” The large man asked in confusion, it seemed like the most obvious solution to their missing animal problem.  
Quill was racing about the ship now, grabbing scattered objects from different rooms such as his beloved tattered jacket and the Taser gun he carried constantly, Gamora could have sworn that he had pocketed a few of Rocket’s small grenades that had been strewn about at one point too. “Well of course we can! But what good is it gonna do? Huh? None!” He grumbled, yanking his mix tape from the ship’s console. “He’s just gonna freakin ignore us again. Stupid raccoon.”  
The others stood back, allowing peter to rant on begrudgingly about their smallest guardian, silently staying out of his way lest he turn his anger towards them. Upon slipping his tape player securely onto his buckle and wrapping the orange headphones around his neck, Peter finally opened the door of the ship, striding out with his gun in hand.  
“Come on, let’s go get him. Dude’s probably gotten himself in another fight.” He muttered. The others stared after him incredulously, before finally following.  
Peter had taken the lead, making his way through the crowds as though he knew exactly where he was going despite the fact that none of the guardians had ever visited the planet before. Groot was in step behind him, using his height to look over the heads of the bustling people on the streets in search of his smaller friend.  
Drax and Gamora on the other hand had decided it was safest to stay a few paces back, leaving Peter to his rampant search, his gun in hand and finger already hovering over the trigger. They weren’t exactly sure whether the man was actually angry at Rocket’s avoidance of the group or the fact that he had most likely gotten himself into trouble, but they knew that once they did find the raccoon, nothing was going to go over well.  
They dodged down alleyways and around the crowds, following Quill as he made his way about the town, all keeping their eyes peeled for a certain furry creature. Peter’s anger was quickly turning to worry as he sped through the streets.  
He had no idea what the layout of the town was, let alone where Rocket could have been at the moment, but he did know that if he at least found a pub, there would be a large chance they would find the troubled raccoon.  
He veered down yet another darkened alleyway, listening for the footsteps of the others as they followed suit. Groot was almost directly on Peter’s heels his heavy feet practically shaking the ground below him as he continued running. He knew that Groot was quite possibly the most worried of the four, he couldn’t remember a time where the two had been separated by choice and now the trigger-happy beast was doing who knows what on a planet in the freaking middle of nowhere completely ignoring the fact that he could quite possibly fall into another panic attack, this time without the protections of his friends.  
Peter pursed his lips at the thought of Rocket getting himself hurt in the midst of a panic attack, or worse. He shuddered, speeding up his pace. Rocket was annoying, and very, very stubborn, especially when it came to admitting his own weaknesses.  
The others had witnessed them, they were all aware of the raccoon’s small quirks. His aggressive behavior was constant of course, in fact, the only time that Peter had ever seen his furry partner with his guard down was during his panic attacks or when Groot had ‘died’ in the crash of Ronan’s ship. It was actually quite unnerving that the one time Quill had seen Rocket when he wasn’t trying to kill someone, was when he was fearing for his own life.  
“Quill, what exactly are we looking for?” He flinched slightly upon hearing Gamora’s voice as she struggled to catch up, leaving Drax to bring up the end of the raccoon tracking brigade.  
Peter didn’t spare her a glance, afraid he would somehow miss a glimpse of Rocket. “Booze, explosions, swearing. Anything that could possibly lead to that stubborn son of a- wait! Did you hear that?” He froze, hearing Gamora stumble to a halt behind him, almost sending the two toppling over.  
The others had also stopped in their tracks, tilting their heads as though to listen. A few silent moments passed before Drax stepped forward, his large brow drawn low in confusion. “What are we listening for.” He whispered. Or at least what could be counted as whispering for the massive man.  
Peter felt Groot shift behind him as he shrugged. Quill frowned, he knew he had heard something. He gave a sigh of defeat when the silence only continued throughout the alleyway. “Must’ve imagined it.” He muttered, making to begin his frantic search again when he heard it again.  
“Shut up!” The somewhat muffled voice shouted, followed by other words, but they were lost to the sound of footsteps on pavement as the four remaining guardians were running again, pushing through the crowds and following that so very familiar and raging voice.  
“Rocket!” He shouted, hoping to hear the raccoon’s voice again.  
“Don’t ever call me that!” The voice was definitely closer now as the group veered around another corner, Groot beginning to take up the lead upon hearing his friend’s shouting. Peter stared incredulously at the sight in front of him. They were approaching what looked like a small bar. Of course that’s where they were going to find Rocket. Although he had to admit that he was mildly surprised by the lack of explosions and gunfire.  
Quill’s hand had barely grasped the door handle of the crowded pub when a disgruntled yelp caught his attention.  
“That was Rocket.” Gamora stated in confusion. The voice hadn’t come from inside the bar. “This way.” She grabbed Peter’s arm, leading him towards the edge of the brick building leading to yet another alleyway.  
The darkness that covered the path made it appear as though it were empty. In fact, the guardians had almost turned away if it hadn’t been for another strangled cry echoing off the walls and the two shadows in the corner that caught Quill’s eye.  
“Rocket!” He shouted, racing towards the smaller shadow. Groot had already beat him there, having crouched in front of the panic riddled animal and waving a large wooden hand in front of his muzzle, hoping to get his attention before falling into yet another attack.  
“No, stop!” Rocket was pulling on his ears and Quill was surprised that the raccoon still had fur atop his head with the amount of yanking he had been doing lately. Groot pulled back instantly, looking up towards Quill with a devastated look in his expressive eyes. It was too late, Rocket was gone again.  
“What happened this time?” He asked irritably, making sure to keep an eye on the hyperventilating animal. Something had to have triggered the attack and Peter was ready to tear whatever that thing was apart for what it had caused.  
“I think our friend over here might be able to answer that.” He turned to face Gamora who was now standing next to the taller shadow. The man’s eyes were wide with surprise and slight fear as the green alien woman tapped her hand over the dagger at her waist.  
Drax finally stepped forward, his knife glinting in the faint light. “This man is not my friend.” He stated plainly, ignoring the confused look that Gamora gave him. “And I will not hesitate to remove his spine if he has done anything to harm the furred one.”  
The smaller man’s eyes widened even further, his hands shooting up in defense instantly. “Wait, wait. I haven’t hurt it, I promise!” He fumbled, taking a tentative step away from Drax’s knife.  
“It?” Drax asked through clenched teeth. He may have not been the most careful person when it came to titles, but he was definitely the most conscious when it came to Rocket, making sure no one else would bring out that horrible heart wrenching look that the raccoon tried so hard to mask with anger.  
The man stumbled back again, sparing a glance from the towering Drax towards Rocket who was now curled in on himself and shaking uncontrollably, his tall tree friend hovering not feet away in case he was needed.  
“Him, h-him. I promise, I didn’t hurt him.” The man corrected himself, looking towards Quill, the only one not pressing a knife to his neck at the moment.  
“Then what are you doing here with Rocket?” Gamora asked, gesturing to the trembling creature behind her.  
“Rocket?” The man asked in confusion, jumping slightly when the raccoon in question let out another strangled cry. Peter was just thankful that he hadn’t tried making a break for it yet, tracking down their missing partner was hard enough the first time, the last thing they needed now was for the panicking creature to try and hide himself on the unfamiliar planet.  
Peter jerked a thumb towards the ring-tail as an answer, slightly shifting his red jacket to show that he wasn’t entirely unarmed, the end of his Taser gun now revealed and easily within reach. “We want to know what happened to our friend here.” He said, studying the other man’s face carefully. “And since you’re the only other one that was here with him, we have some questions for you.”  
…  
Rogers hadn’t meant any harm to the creature. In fact, the former scientist had been hoping to make amends with the creature. Although, their meeting hadn’t been all too expected. After the genetically modified raccoon had escaped from the once hidden laboratory, he couldn’t help but think him dead by now, not ever been taught how to survive on his own.  
He had never been one to do the actual dissections or experiments. His field contained getting the subject to and from the operation table, as well as keeping it restrained. A job that was just as enjoyable as it sounded if anyone liked the sound of painful screams and thrashing animals as he pulled harshly on the tethers around their necks. But he hadn’t gone to eight years of schooling to give up such a chance. To be included in such a revolutional change to scientific history. They had told him they were creating a new super-species. But they hadn’t told them that not only was the creation of this species illegal, but also torturous to the creatures.  
He had seen quite a few experimental subjects in his few years of work. Animals taken from different planets all over the galaxy, many of which he had never seen before. Unfortunately, due to the ruthless tests and experiments he had only seen them a few times before a new subject was strapped to the end of that metallic leash.  
But for as many creatures that they had lost, there was one that the scientist kept finding himself strapping to that damned operation table. A small Terran mammal who’s screams rung the loudest in the man’s head, who’s claw marks littered the majority of his forearms, and who’s bloodied neck and wrists left his coats stained red at the sleeves.  
The raccoon was the only creature to have survived as long as he had in the laboratories and he honestly couldn’t tell if that was even a good thing at this point. It had been bad enough hearing the animal’s cries of agony, but the moment he found out that he had survived the vocal transfer, he found himself wishing that the creature had been killed in the process.  
The heart wrenching screams had tortured him every night since that day. Unfortunately for him, the job only got better. He was promoted. He kept his old job, of course. He couldn’t bear the thought of another one of those heartless men restraining the creature to the tables, yanking him from its cage, hard enough to crack a rib.  
But his new position opened his eyes to a new form of torture, one that he didn’t believe even these monsters would ever fall to. Electrocution.  
It had taken months for the metal implants to be infused with the animal’s spinal cord and its reactions had been almost fatal. Infections and claw marks had left countless scars littered about the skin, making fur growth almost impossible in the areas.  
He wanted so badly to deny himself of the promotion, he could hardly stand his job now, how was he supposed to be able to just stand there and watch as they sent electric shocks through the poor animal from the inside out? But it was just that thought that forced him to do what he was doing now, plugging the thick wires into the implants and giving the thumbs up to the man behind the control panel. If he didn’t want to harm the subject, someone would, someone who wasn’t afraid to torture the small Terran mammal to its eventual death.  
So to say that he was terrified during the attack from Nova was an understatement. Everything that he had done, everything he had witnessed, he was sure to be sentenced to prison for his crimes.  
He had been in the room with the creature when they had been hit, scolding one of the men for using the creature’s sensitive back to keep it from writhing off of the table, fighting to keep control of one of its arms. The other scientists had already begun to flee, tearing off their lab coats and taking off through the hallways in hopes of escape.  
He himself had begun on his trek down the corridor when something caught his eye. The raccoon. He had thought one of his partners had grabbed the subject after hearing them rant on about ‘evidence.’ Yet here it was, dodging the gloved hands of the frantic workers as he ran on all fours down the hallway.  
Rogers contemplated going after the thing when he realized that someone had already taken the position. Campbell had never been one that anybody had really gotten along with. But he was most certainly the best in his field of his biological and cybernetic abilities. He had practically created the escaping raccoon, and by the look of the gun clutched tightly in his hand, he wasn’t about to let his ‘creation’ get away so easily.  
Rogers began making his way down the halls again, this time following closely behind Campbell as he shouted in anger after the creature. He wasn’t exactly sure how long he had been running, only that he was stopped in his tracks the moment he heard the gun shots.  
Looking down, Rogers’ blood ran cold. A Nova officer bleeding to death on the ground, Campbell spasaming violently, practically frothing at the mouth before lying lifelessly, his eyes still open, and a certain raccoon standing above them both, a deadly weapon clutched tightly in his small hands.  
After that, Rogers had run. Ending up as one of the few scientists to have escaped the attack of Nova. He had created a new life for himself after that day. Luckily for him, there was no family tying him to his current position, let along the planet in itself.  
Within the next few years, Rogers had bought himself his own ship, using his scientific abilities to good use as a traveling doctor. His latest patient had been on some uncharted planet just off of Xandar, some disease that had blinded a woman after having been bitten by some sort of arachnid. The venom had been easy to extract, and afterwards, he found a small pub on his way back to the ship.  
He wasn’t one to drink regularly, but he found no harm in visiting the local bars every once and a while. Rogers had downed his second drink and ordering another when there was suddenly another presence at this side. He turned his head to acknowledge the one next to him when he found that the customer happened to be much smaller than himself.  
He almost choked on his drink upon looking down, hoping it was some sort of hallucination from the alcohol as the somewhat familiar looking creature pulled himself up onto the tattered stool beside him. It was impossible, there was no way that the subject could have survived for this long outside the lab. His implants and cybernetics needed constant repair, how could it have fed itself? The questions were racing through his mind at a mile a minute as the raccoon ordered itself a drink.  
It boggled his mind. Rogers simply couldn’t look away, staring at the creature that mas now taking a drink of the blue liquid in its glass. Was that even possible? No animal should be able to ingest such toxins as alcohol, but it didn’t seem to mind.  
Although it did seem to mind Rogers’ unwavering gaze, turning itself away uncomfortably, and he really couldn’t blame it, he was sure his staring was unsettling, but he just couldn’t seem to find the strength to look away. Was this the subject that he had thought dead long ago? The creature he had tortured. There was only one way to find out.  
The raccoon had acquired clothing somehow and the orange jumpsuit-like garment covered where the metallic implants would have been, making Rogers’ thoughts only wander more. There was really only one reason he could think of for a raccoon to wear clothing, and by the way the creature’s shoulders were shifting forward, he could only believe that there was scarred tissue lying under the fabric.  
He hadn’t even been paying attention to his own movements until he felt the fabric of the animal’s suit under his hand. The creature’s reaction was instantaneous, his back arching as pain coursed through its small body. Rogers retracted his hand in shock, not that he was expecting any less. How many biologically enhanced raccoons were there in the galaxy?  
“What do you think you’re doing?” The animal snapped, leaping up on his stool. Roger’s eyes widened in shock. He knew they had given the creature the vocalization of the superior beings, but he had only ever heard the thing shouting short stammering phrases in the midst of its pain and fear.  
He was even more shocked when the subject kept going. “What, you don’t think it’s creepy enough to ogle me like I’m some sort of exhibit?” He shouted angrily. “Sorry, but this display is off limits!”  
“Still hasn’t healed then?” He hadn’t even realized that he was speaking until the words were already out of his mouth.  
The raccoon stiffened visibly and eyed him warily. “What are you talking about?” It asked.  
“Your scars.” Rogers explained, watching solemnly when the animal took a step back his angry face slipping into something much more familiar to the former scientist, fear. He knew that he was still talking but the words seemed to just be spilling out of him at this point, the only thing that stopped him was the sound of the subject’s glass shattering upon the floor.  
Rogers stared at the creature incredulously as the thing bared its sharp teeth before leaping off of the bar stool and racing on all fours toward the doorway. No. He had just found the creature, after so many years of lying awake at night, hearing nothing but its screams of agony. He got out of his seat, taking off to follow the creature.  
Of course, now as he was slowly being surrounded by four quite menacing people claiming to be ‘Rocket’s’ friends, he decided that it wasn’t his best decision.


	7. Chapter 7

Rocket’s head hurt. Actually, that was a lie. Rocket’s head was pounding with agonizing pain when he woke up. He wasn’t exactly sure when he had gotten back to the Milano, let alone in his own bed, but when he finally decided to open his eyes, the raccoon found himself in his room, the covers pulled over him and the recently demolished door propped against the hole in the wall to keep the hallway light from streaming in, most likely thanks to Groot.  
He sat up and peeled the tattered sheets off of himself, wincing when his headache decided it wasn’t quite ready to leave. “Ugh, what hit me?” He asked himself, pressing his small hands to the sides of his head, trying to relieve himself of the pain.  
Allowing the pounding in his head to fade to a dull thudding, Rocket glanced about the room. Groot was nowhere to be found, but he couldn’t help but let a small smile escape his otherwise aggressive demeanor when he saw the small flower that had been placed at the side of his bed.  
It was obvious that the two were the oddest of friends, and the other guardians, although having come to terms with it, still often watched the pair with great interest. And who could blame them really? They were practically polar opposites. Rocket, the aggressive, trigger-happy, escaped criminal, and Groot, the gentle giant that had, for some unknown reason, dedicated his life to protecting the small creature.  
His feet hit the metallic floor with a soft thud and Rocket made his way towards the leaning door, slinging one of his oversized guns over his shoulder as he did, not wanting to forget it again. Once the weapon was secured around his orange jumpsuit, he ducked out of the small opening between the door and the wall, careful not to knock it over as he slipped through the small opening lest it fall and hurt him further. He quickly closed his eyes tightly upon seeing the bright light and he silently swore to himself that he was going to kill whoever hit him.  
A knot formed in his gut as he opened his eyes again, he knew that he had fallen into another episode again. Weakness. It pained him to know that the others saw him as fragile now, so much so that they had to knock him upside the head just to get him on the ship without killing himself… he bet it was Drax.  
But the raccoon’s proud demeanor kept him from turning back to his room, knowing that hiding wasn’t about to help anything. He strained to remember exactly what had happened before he had been thrown back into his delirious mentality of the laboratories again and almost tripped over his own feet.  
The scientist at the bar.  
…  
“Is he okay?” Peter asked Groot when the large being entered the room.  
“He’s fine Quill.” Gamora answered, nodding towards Groot for confirmation before turning back towards the front of the ship where their ‘guest’ was sitting.  
“I still don’t understand why we had to knock him out.” He muttered, the guilt gnawing at his gut just thinking about Drax’s large hand whacking the raccoon into unconsciousness.  
“He was panicking Quill. There was no way we were going to get him to cooperate with us while in that state. What were we supposed to do?” Gamora retorted, still weaving through the hallways and up the stairs to the upper part of the ship.  
“Um, I don’t know, wait for him to calm down maybe?” Peter stated incredulously. He really didn’t see how the others didn’t find just knocking Rocket out was a problem. “You don’t just go around giving people concussions because they don’t ‘cooperate.’ That’s not how we solve our problems around here!”  
“That is how I solve my problems.” Drax put in. He was sitting across from the man they had found in the alleyway who they had forced upon the Milano. Peter knew that having the stranger on board his ship wouldn’t do much in terms of helping Rocket, but at this point he was really up to listening to anyone if it had the smallest chance of finding out more on the raccoon’s condition. And since, the guy had been the only one there to either trigger or witness the attack, he was their only lead.  
“Well, you were in prison for a reason.” Peter quipped, watching closely as their captive fidgeted nervously in his seat upon hearing the comment. Drax didn’t seem to take notice though.  
“I was not convicted for sending anyone into unconsciousness.” He stated defensively. “I had removed a man’s spine from his body.”  
“And there you go.”  
“Quill.” Gamora snapped, grasping the half-Terran’s shoulder and spinning him around so that he faced her. “We need to focus.”  
The focus in question shifted once again in his seat. Peter was sure that had Groot not been standing mere feet behind him, the man would have already taken off in his attempt escape from the Milano. Although it was obvious that he hadn’t taken kindly to being apprehended, the guardians had found it quite easy to get him onto the ship, which made Peter wonder if he even had anything to do with Rocket’s current state.  
“Ugh, fine, but this conversation isn’t over.” He managed through a sigh of defeat. Turning to their mystery man, Peter hardened his glare, looking the man over for any weapons. Although seeing as though he had yet to pull anything whilst being forced onto the Milano in the first place, it was unlikely he had so much as a pocket knife on him, but it didn’t settle Peter’s nerves either way.  
Rogers had made a horrible, horrible mistake of agreeing to come on the ship with the four strangers. He should have run when he had the chance, but his immense curiosity of the long lost raccoon had overcome him. Well, that and the large tree-like creature behind him had walked only inches behind him, eliminating chances of escape.  
The ship itself was much larger than Rogers had been expecting it to be. Despite the fact that there seemed to be five living on it, he hadn’t expected their craft to be much larger than his own. In terms of money, he hadn’t thought that the mysterious care takers of the so called ‘Rocket’ would have been able to afford anything of the size.  
But despite his astonishment and disbelief, the four humanoids lead him onto the orange and blue ship nonetheless. The wooden being behind him held the unconscious raccoon in his large arms after the larger man who for some reason had refused to put on a shirt, had sent the small animal tumbling to the ground with a swift fist to the back of the head. The more human looking man hadn’t taken kindly to the fact that their small friend was now unconscious, but led them up the stairwell and into the cockpit of the ship anyway, pointing the shirtless one to lead him towards a separate room while the others walked along side the tree being in the opposite direction.  
It hadn’t taken long for them to return, the blonde man still ranting about the seemingly unnecessary comatose state of their pet. At least he guessed the former subject was a pet, but he really couldn’t tell at this point, and quite frankly, he was too afraid of having his spine removed by the large mass of a man in front of him to ask.  
After another minute of bickering between the blonde man and the green woman who still had her dagger in her hand, ready to strike if provoked, the attention was again turned back towards Rogers. “Listen, I don’t want any trouble.” He said, trying to prove his innocence in the situation. The one addressed as ‘Quill’ pursed his lips, turning towards him and crossing his arms across his chest, looking the former scientist up and down as though scanning for any sign of threat.  
The green woman scoffed, rolling her eyes at Rogers’ comment. “If you didn’t want this trouble, then you wouldn’t have attacked Rocket in the first place.” She stated plainly glaring at the man, her jaw locked sternly.  
Rogers threw his hands up in defense. “I never attacked anyone.” He managed, his heart pounding with fear of the lunatics on the ship. It was already stated that the larger of the men had been to prison already, but Rogers would have found it a safe bet to say that all of the people in the room surrounding him were escaped convicts at one point or another.  
The green skinned lady only scrunched up her nose in disbelief and rage. “I do not believe you.” She said bluntly, pointing her dagger towards the man in the chair.  
“Well to be fair, Rocket does have the tendency to shoot first, ask questions never.” Quill put in, causing the remaining three psychopaths turn to him in disbelief.  
“You are taking this man’s side?” The tattooed one sitting across from Roger’s asked, pointing his own knife towards his chest. He looked up hopefully towards the other man in question, thinking that he may at least have one person taking things from his perspective.  
“What? No!” Quill stated, dashing all of Roger’s false hopes away. “I’m just saying that maybe he’s not entirely lying. Rocket knows how to take care of himself and due to the immense lack of explosions, I doubt that it was an actual fight.”  
“Perhaps that’s because he was having another blasted panic attack!” The woman shouted, throwing her arms up in anger.  
“I am Groot.” The deep voice behind him made Rogers jump in his seat and whirl around to face the giant tree being. He was sure that the thing was incapable of speech and the sudden and quite unrelated comment surprised him to no end.  
“Even the tree man agrees with us.” The tattooed one stated, gesturing to ‘Groot.’ Although how he had translated “I am Groot” to agreement was beyond him.  
“I never said that I didn’t!” Quill practically shouted. “I’m just saying that I think we should give him the benefit of the doubt. Although, I would like to know what did happen.” He finished, looking back towards Rogers who had been almost hoping that the four had forgotten he was still there.  
“I’m sure we all would.” The green one agreed. Rogers had barely a chance to take in his surroundings before the horrifyingly familiar feel of the cool metal of a knife against his throat. “Tell us.”  
“Wow, wow! Gamora, come one what did I just say about not solving our problems with violence?” Quill shouted, running his hands through his blonde hair.  
“I find that rule unsuitable for this situation.” Stated the shirtless one plainly, running the rag in his hand over the blade of his own knife.  
“And that’s why you went to prison!” He retorted, in disbelief.  
“Were you not in prison as well?”  
“Not for freaking murder!”  
“We are getting nowhere!” Gamora cried, pressing the knife further against the man’s throat, drawing a thin line of blood. The man in the chair took a hitched breath, his eyes widening with fear.  
“Wait, wait, wait!” He practically shouted, pushing himself against the back of the chair he was sitting in, beads of sweat beginning to form above his brow. “I-I promise, I didn’t do anything to him.” He stuttered, wincing when Gamora’s knife only pressed harder.  
“Then what were you doing in that alleyway with him?” She raged. It surprised Peter to no end at how protective the warrior was being at the moment. The two had never really gotten along, not that there had been much argument between her and Rocket either. To be honest, Peter had never seen the two strike up an actual conversation before besides those early morning arguments when Gamora found one of the raccoon’s discarded inventions strewn about her cabin.  
But for whatever reason, Gamora wasn’t about to let their captive go without an answer, and by the looks of it, so far it was working. “No, no I know Subject- I mean Rocket! I know him.” The man cried, his eyes glued to the blade in the green woman’s green hand.  
“What did you just say?” Drax asked, standing up from his seat. He exchanged a wary glance with Peter before staring back toward the seated man.  
“I know him, I do!” He countered, his eyes pleading as he looked towards Quill, the only one not attacking him now.  
“I am Groot.” The Flora Colossus said, standing up tall behind their captive and glaring daggers toward Peter. His voice was filled with something that he had never heard from the usually gentle tree, anger.  
But Peter had already stopped listening, his mind wandering to something much darker. He had never approached Rocket with the subject of his past, deciding he knew all that he needed to since that night at the bar. Well I didn’t ask to be made! I didn’t ask to be taken apart and put back together, over and over again. The words still haunted him, it had struck all of the guardians as a day to remember. The day Rocket had ever actually opened up to any of them, besides Groot that is.  
He felt rage fill his gut as he was pulled back into reality. “Subject?” He practically seethed. He didn’t know that much about how Rocket worked, but he sure as hell knew that the title of ‘subject’ wouldn’t have sat well with the raccoon. “What did you mean ‘Subject?’?” He asked angrily, silently wishing that he had his own knife on hand to press against the guy’s neck, but luckily he already had Gamora and Drax filling that position for him as their glared also hardened. Groot frowned, reflecting Peter’s anger in his dark eyes.  
“I’m sorry, I-“  
But the man didn’t get very far before he was struck in the jaw with one of Drax’s large clenched fists. He blinked rapidly, trying to shake off the pain as he felt a bruise already forming on his throbbing face. “Answer the question.” The tattooed man said angrily, his teeth clenched and his eyes practically glowing with rage. The man gulped, wincing when another drop of crimson blood ran down the hilt of Gamora’s knife.  
Peter’s mind was reeling. It was not only unnerving hearing this man say that he somehow knew Rocket, (which in their case usually meant that their trigger-happy friend had done something in terms of explosives or prison escapes) but he had addressed him as ‘Subject.’  
Now Peter hadn’t known Rocket for all that long, and he certainly didn’t consider himself an expert on his partner’s past, but he sure as hell knew that the term meant only one thing. “You bastard.” He spat, causing the others to stare at him in confusion while their captive only bit his lip in anticipation. He felt rage fill his mind and his lip curl into a disgusted grimace. “How could you?” He shouted ignoring the looks of puzzlement.  
“Quill…” Gamora whispered harshly, trying to pull him out of his raging daze.  
“I know what you’re thinking.” The man began frantically, almost making Quill laugh at the pure disgust that he now felt towards their captive, but he didn’t cut him off. Peter wanted to hear his excuse. “I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. What I did then was horrible, and I’m sorry, but-“  
“Let me stop you there.” Peter said, holding a hand up. “What you did then was horrible. In fact, it disgusts me that you’re even on my ship right now, but you have no right to apologize. Saying that this somehow isn’t your fault! In case you haven’t noticed, our friend is having quite the problem with handling his own anxieties because of what you’ve done to him and no amounts of apologies are ever going to change that!”  
It had dawned upon the others exactly what Peter was talking about now and the anger in their glares had only deepened upon hearing Star Lord’s speech.  
Drax look as though he was about to throw another punch when another voice caught everyone in the room off guard.  
“Alright, which one of you idiots hit me?!” Rocket shouted, making everyone freeze. The irritable raccoon had just barely made it up the stairs before stumbling back, his eyes wide with fear and his small hand grasping to the metal railing with a death grip while the other slid from his throbbing head and to his seizing chest.  
“Rocket?” Peter asked hesitantly. The others stared back nervously, Gamora and Drax having dropped their weapons (or in Drax’s case, his fists) and exchanged wary glances. Groot’s face lit up instantly upon seeing his furry friend and had already made his way over to the raccoon, letting out a gleeful ‘I am Groot’ as he did.  
But Rocket took no notice, his eyes were staring emptily at the man in the chair. Peter felt his stomach tighten, afraid that they were going to have to resort to knocking him out again but only stared nervously when the orange clad raccoon raised an accusing finger pointed towards the seated man. “What is he doing here?” He asked, his voice quivering despite the angry tone he was trying to mask it with.  
“We found him in the alleyway with you, while you… um… were having an episode.” Quill managed, looking away quickly when Rocket shot him a glare, obviously still not wanting to approach that particular issue.  
“If it makes any difference, to the furred one, I had offered to remove his spine from his body.” Drax cut in, oblivious to Gamora’s eye roll and their mystery man’s questioning look.  
“I am Groot.” The large being said, his tone now significantly softer but the raccoon still flinched nonetheless as the pounding in his head throbbed against his small skull.  
“Yeah, I’m fine.” Rocket responded, patting a hand against Groot’s wooden leg, ignoring the look of shock that the man in the chair gave him. “But I want him outta here.” He finished, gesturing blindly across the room, refusing to meet anyone’s eye as he made his way to the front of the ship, taking hold of one of his many weapons and began tampering with the make, tugging at dials and wires as though the thing were actually broken.  
The other guardians had been quick to pick up on Rocket’s nervous habit long ago. His constant tinkering had at first seemed like an unhealthy obsession that the raccoon had picked up, but the more that the Guardians watched, the more they had begun to realize what this quirk really was. Waking in the middle of the nights, from what Peter now decided was due to countless nightmares, to start of a new invention. No one had ever brought it up with one another, let alone with their smaller colleague, but it was obvious now that Rocket was most certainly not ‘fine’ as he pried apart his own invention with shaky hands, his back to the remaining five in the room.  
No one dared move and the feeling in Peter’s gut had only become worse as his mind was riddled with guilt. He turned blankly to the man in the chair, gesturing for Gamora to release her hold and back away. She gave him a distrustful look before dropping her hand to her side and sneering back at the man.  
Peter was quick to grab him by the collar of his shirt, yanking him forcefully out of his seat and stumbling to his feet. “Come on, you herd him.” He stated, walking over to lead their captive back out of the ship.  
“Wait.” Peter stopped and he could have sworn that he had seen Rocket flinch out of the corner of his eye when the man finally spoke up before turning sharply towards the raccoon. “Listen I-“ But Drax was quick to stop him short, raising a large fist in the air.  
“You do not get to speak with him!” The muscled man shouted, making Rocket wince again as his headache pounded harder upon hearing the loud voice, but he stood up shakily anyway, holding the red and blue wired tightly in his clenched hands as he did so.  
“Hold up Drax.” He called, making everyone turn with looks of bewilderment towards their furred companion. Dark eyes still downcast blankly at his now dismantled invention, Rocket continued. “Let him talk.”  
Peter pursed his lips with distrust, he had already made things worse bringing Rocket’s personal torturer back into his life, but he knew that the raccoon’s defensive behavior (and a rather annoying one at that) wasn’t about to back down from this fight. So with a sigh of defeat, Peter let go of the man’s collar, gesturing for Drax and the others to back down as well, crossing his arms across his chest, not taking his eyes off of the stumbling scientist.  
“Alone?” He inquired, almost making Quill want to sic Drax on him again.  
“Don’t push it.” He answered angrily, only breaking eye contact when Rocket spoke up again, his tone surprisingly serious compared to his usual sarcasm.  
“Quill.” He said sharply, before making his way back over to the stairwell, gesturing for the scientist to follow.  
“What? Rocket, you can’t be serious!” He cried after him, grasping the raccoon by the arm and pulling him back to face him. “Listen, I’m sorry we brought him here, I messed up but don’t do this to yourself.” He argued.  
Rocket only pulled his arm back. “Trust me, I can handle this.” He said, patting the ever present gun strapped to his back.  
“I trust you.” Peter commented, crossing his arms again. “It’s Dr. Dolittle that I don’t trust.” But he didn’t fight it anymore, watching carefully as the two made their way down the stairway.  
…  
“What do you want?” The door had barely closed behind the former scientist before Rocket had begun talking. He tried his best to mask the shakiness in is voice, but it somehow still made its way through. He heard the man take a deep breath of his own before stepping towards the creature who was making an effort to avoid his gaze, pulling at the hem of his small jumpsuit and taking small quickened breaths.  
Taking a gulp of air, the former scientist finally decided to break the ice. “I’m sorry.” He said truthfully, glancing down when the raccoon only scoffed, turning sharply to face his, his eyes lit with rage as he clenched his small hands into fists at his sides. Rocket couldn’t believe what he was hearing.  
“For what? Ruining my life?” He seethed, cursing himself for the break in his voice . Rogers shut his mouth instantly, only looking down sorrowfully at the creature. “Do you have any idea what you’ve put me through? What you did to me?”  
He almost laughed out loud when the man turned away his gaze. “What? Can’t stand to look at me? Can’t stand to look at the monster that you’ve created?” He was shouting now, his throat growing tight as his eyes filled with unwanted tears.  
“It’s not like that.” The scientist countered. “It’s not like we knew that-“  
“That what? I was capable of feeling pain? Of thinking for myself?” He shouted, he wasn’t even thinking anymore as he reached a hand around his back again feeling for the plasma blaster that he had strapped to himself earlier that day. It was mainly for security reasons, since he had hated that feeling of being ill prepared like he had been while in that damned alleyway, but even just feeling the cool metal under his skin made Rocket want to pull it out and shoot the man right then and there.  
“You killed Campbell that day.” The comment made Rocket stop short, his arms falling back to his sides. He didn’t recall the name, he hadn’t really paid attention to the titles of the people that were prodding him with syringes or forcing electric wires into his body, but he sure as hell knew who the man was talking about.  
“Well he damn well deserved it.” He managed. Rocket wasn’t one for guilt, he had shot and killed multiple people, smiling all the way as he did, which was what had landed him in prison for the majority of those twenty-three times, yet he had never shaken the blank stare of the first man he had ever murdered. The unmoving, glazed over eyes that simply stared into nothingness. “I’m not going to apologize for defending myself if that’s what you want.” He stated plainly, gritting his teeth.  
“I wasn’t asking you to.” The man responded. “Just thought you should know. To be honest, I hadn’t expected you to have survived this long.” Rocket shot him an offended glare. “Well I mean with the cybernetics and protecting yourself and everything.” He quickly added  
The raccoon scoffed. “I’ve built and shot enough of these things in my lifetime out of that hellhole to know how they work, and I’m not hesitant to aim it at your big head if you dare try and take me back again.” Rocket managed, grabbing the gun strapped to his back and holding it out for show, smirking when the man in front of his stiffened visibly.  
“There’s nothing to take you back to.” He admitted. “The day you got out was the day Nova shut us down. There’s nothing left.” His voice almost sounded sorrowful, but Rocket paid no attention.  
“Good riddance.” He murmured. “Otherwise I’d have to make sure Halfworld was our next stop.” Rogers took a nervous step back as Rocket switched on his gun for show, grinning to himself at the man’s reaction.  
Rogers opened his mouth to speak again when the ship lurched to the side, sending both raccoon and scientist alike tumbling over. A tremor shook the cabin as the familiar sound of a powerful blast hitting metal shook the Milano, “What the hell?” He murmured, rubbing his head. He knew they had knocked him out for a reason, but he swore that he was going to give whoever caused him this unwavering headache a good few blasts to the head with his plasma blaster.   
The door was practically thrown open as Gamora entered the room, her eyes wide with panic. “What’s going on?” He asked, grasping the wall for support as another tremor shook the ship.  
“We’re being attacked.” The green woman said, worry etched in her voice as she made her way over to him. “Quill’s working on getting us off the ground, but we have no idea why they’re shooting or even what planet they’re from.”  
“Have we taken any damage?” The raccoon inquired quickly, pushing away from her hands as they reached over to help him up, ignoring her look of disappointment, he wasn’t really in the mood for this whole ‘team bonding’ thing they were trying to get him to join.  
She shook her head. “Thanks to Nova, we’ve got a sturdier ship, but if Quill doesn’t get us out of here quickly, we won’t have that advantage for long.”  
Rocket nodded, already making his way back to the cockpit, trying to ignore the fact that Rogers was still following them both up the stairs. He practically leapt into the seat next to Peter, taking hold of the controls for his personal favorite addition to the Milano, the weaponry. Quill gave him a wary look but kept quiet, pulling up on his own controls, finally lifting the ship into the air.  
Rocket knew that none of his partners wanted him in the fight, afraid his sudden fragility would take over again, but he refused to abide by their suspicions. He would admit to being many things including inconsiderate, sarcastic, and downright insane, but he was not weak, and he was not going to sit out on this fight either.  
“Any idea who we’re dealing with here!” He shouted over the gunfire as another blast shook the ship, sending Rogers into the nearby table to which Rocket snickered.  
Quill shook his head, turning sharply to dodge their attackers. “They came out of nowhere. Don’t even know what kind of ship it is. I’ve never seen anything like it before!” He answered, his brow drawn low in concentration guiding the Milano higher.  
“Wait!” Rogers’ voice caught everyone off guard and Rocket quickly ceased in his fire to follow the man’s gaze. He was practically pressed against the window of the ship, staring blankly at the attackers’ white ship, his eyes wide with disbelief. “That’s not possible.” He almost whispered.  
“You know them?” Quill called back.  
Rocket’s breath hitched in his throat, his ears pressing up against his head. He knew what the answer was going to be before Roger’s even had a chance to say it, not that he could have heard it anyway with the ringing in his ears. “It’s a Halfworld ship.”


	8. Chapter 8

Quill was tense at the controls, directing the Milano away from the firing ship. He wasn’t sure what kind of artillery was being used on the white craft, but whatever they were shooting was certainly damaging his ship.   
“What’s Halfworld?” Gamora asked, voicing everyone’s question. Groot on the other hand had already made his way to Rocket’s side, wrapping his branch-like arms around the creature who only stared blankly into their hitch-hiker’s eyes, his face devoid of expression.  
“Rocket, who are they?” He said, trying to break the raccoon out of his shocked state of mind. But his furred friend refused to respond, instead baring his teeth and drawing his brow low angrily.  
“You liar!” He shouted, causing Peter to almost lose his grip on the controls from surprise. Rocket thrust an accusing index finger at the man, only being held back by Groot as he struggled to leave his seat. “You said there was nothing left!” He continued, kicking and scratching at his friends arms, leaving tiny grooves in the tree’s bark, but Groot refused to let go, simply staring at the scientist with a look of anger.  
Quill managed a glance at the scientist, the man had only broken his gaze at the attacking ship to face the furious animal. “There wasn’t, I’m sure.” He stammered, holding his hands out as though it would somehow prove his innocence.  
He couldn’t pick up much from the conversation, but it was enough to alert Peter exactly what the circumstances were. “These pals of yours?” He asked sarcastically, reaching over to Rocket’s controls and launching a blast at the white ship.  
“No!” He shouted defensively, his outburst cut short as another blast lit the dark void of space with the orange and yellow flames of an explosion. “This isn’t possible, they would have been caught…” He trailed off, looking back to the attackers as though inspecting their ship. The tinted windows of the white craft kept those on the Milano from seeing in.  
“You knew about this?” Gamora spoke up, gesturing angrily towards the window. “You led them here!” Peter didn’t need to spare a glance in their direction to know that the green woman had yet again pulled out her dagger.  
“No! Not purposefully at least.” Rogers tried explaining, stumbling back from the knife. No one spoke, glaring at him, awaiting further explanation. Rocket’s glare was wavering between the line of fury and fear, his darkened eyes locked on the former scientist in front of him, only flickering away to glance warily at the Halfworld craft.  
“A few years after Nova shut us down, a group of the escaped employees came to me with the idea of starting a second base on board a ship.” He began tentatively, wincing when the raccoon tried lunging, the large tree figure being the only thing keeping Roger’s unscathed at this point, although the stiffened expression that Groot wore, he wasn’t sure how much longer he would be graced with that advantage.  
“I declined the invitation.” He added quickly, continuing his justification. “I regret everything from Halfworld and wanted nothing to do with it, thinking the Nova attack was a sign from above. They left to continue their search, but I didn’t think they would ever have been capable of it without being caught by authorities first.”  
“Search for what exactly?” Gamora asked, gritting her teeth while Drax clenched his large fists not a foot behind her. Rogers only looked up guiltily towards the raging raccoon.  
Peter almost lost the controls again when the answer dawned upon him, a sinking feeling filling his gut as Rocket stopped in his frantic thrashing to back up against Groot’s protective hold for a sense of security. “They’re here for me?” He managed, not even trying to mask the wavering of his voice when he spoke.  
A small nod from the former scientist was all it took to bring a frightened whimper from the creature’s throat as he scrambled further into Groot’s hold. “Y-you led them to me.” He stammered, his furry brow drawing low with accusation.  
Peter had expected another outburst from the man trying to explain himself again, but he only looked down towards the floor guiltily. “I didn’t mean to, I don’t even know how they found my location.” He said somberly, but it didn’t do anything in calming the now hyperventilating raccoon.  
“Hey! Rocket?” Peter cried, snapping his fingers with one hand in front of his comrade’s muzzle, keeping the Milano upright with the other. To his relief, the raccoon snapped his head toward the guardian, his eyes wide with panic. “I need you to calm down buddy, we can’t lose you now.” He stated, watching as his friend’s stiffened body began to shake.  
“I can’t go back there.” The broken sob made Peter want nothing but to drop the controls and wrap the creature in a protective hold, but seeing as though Groot had already taken that position and he was needed at the reins, he was forced to settle with simply placing a hand on his furry shoulder.  
“You’re not going anywhere Rocket.” He promised, keeping eye contact for as long as he could before another blast from the attackers shook the ship. “Groot, and Drax.” He called over his shoulder. Drax dropped his raging gaze from Rogers toward Quill, awaiting further instruction. “Get Rocket out of here and below. Rocket.” The raccoon had been staring fearfully towards the white ship and the only thing that told Peter that he was even listening there his ears that had rose from their position plastered to the furred head and towards the taller guardian.  
“Rocket, look at me.” He tried again, letting out a breath of relief when the quivering ring-tail looked towards him again only sparing a quick glance toward the Halfworld ship. “No one is taking you anywhere, but I need you to stay calm for me, okay?” He barely got a nod in response to his question before a large tremor jolted the ship. “Okay, get him out of here.” He called. Groot didn’t need to be told twice as he gathered his friend up in a protective hold before taking off down the stairs, Drax hot on his heels.  
“Gamora, I need you on weapons here.” He shouted, the green woman appearing in the seat to the right of him almost instantly, grabbing the controls in her slender hands. Rocket of course knew how to handle the weapons of the ship the best, seeing as though he had designed most of them himself, but Gamora was more than adequate in taking charge of the controls herself.  
Quill had almost forgotten about the sixth member aboard the ship until Rogers was standing almost directly beside him. He grit his teeth irritably. The last thing he needed right now was to speak to the one that had caused this chaos. But the former scientist didn’t seem to get the message.  
“I can help.” He stated plainly, grasping onto the back of Peter’s seat when the cabin shook.  
“Oh yeah?” The Terran called back, sarcasm practically dripping from his mouth. “I think you’ve helped us enough here.” But the unwavering stance of the man beside his seat despite the massive tremors and tilting of the ship told Peter that he wasn’t about to take no for an answer.  
“Ugh, fine. But you’re to stay away from Rocket. Anything that happens to him now is on your head and the last thing he needs right now is another panic attack.” The man beside him didn’t look happy at his instruction but he nodded nonetheless. “What can you tell us about this ship?” He asked as soon as Roger’s sat himself down.  
“Not much, like I said, I had turned down the job offer, I wasn’t there for the production of this thing.” He shouted over another explosion.  
“Okay, how about this then?” Peter began irritably. “What do they want with Rocket? Couldn’t they have used their other experiments, or started over or something? If it really has been years, it seems like a lot of wasted time searching for one psychotic raccoon.” He asked. Gamora turned toward the man as well, most likely considering the same question.  
Roger’s wasn’t quick to answer, his stature stiffening drastically and pursing his lips upon hearing the question. “Because he’s the only subject to have survived through the tests he’s been put through and the only one to have escaped.”  
Quill almost crashed the ship entirely while Gamora halted in her firing. “You’re telling me that they want him back because all of you other prisoners were killed by those sick experiments?” He asked incredulously.  
Rogers nodded in confirmation and Peter’s grip on the controls tightened immensely. “Perfect.” He managed through gritted teeth.  
…  
Rocket’s heart was pounding so hard that he truly feared that the thing would somehow force its way out of his small heaving chest. Groot and Drax had taken him down a level and into one of the less cluttered rooms before the raccoon had practically launched himself from the tree-man’s hold, gasping for air as though his lungs were collapsing in on themselves.  
Neither of the substantially larger occupants of the room made any move to touch Rocket while in his state and he silently thanked them for that, ignoring the tug of humiliation of the other guardians seeing him like this when another wave of panic shook his body.  
He wanted desperately for them to leave him alone, leaving the raccoon to himself, but in all honesty, the thing he feared now most was the feeling of being alone. He wasn’t about to curl up in Drax’s arms and allow the large man to pet him again like some domesticated animal, but simply having the large man beside Groot in the room with him helped drastically.  
Rocket had never been one for physical contact, in fact, the only one on the Milano that he had ever allowed to ouch him was Groot. His time on that damned planet, Halfworld, had dashed away the chances of the others making the same contact with the creature long ago. The simple gesture of placing a friendly hand on his shoulder sparking up memories of being forced onto the metallic table, everyone knew that the raccoon’s sensitive back was off limits, even if only Peter and Groot were the ones to have actually seen what lay beneath his jumpsuits. His tail and the scruff of his neck were another story. Drax had the horrible habit of lifting Rocket like a helpless animal when in a furious debate with the creature, usually getting himself a good scratch to the face afterwards.  
The Guardians weren’t ones to harm him purposefully, usually only hoping to keep the raccoon from walking away from them when they were trying to speak with him or get his attention such as when Rocket had almost broken Quill’s precious Walkman. And his tail just happened to be the easiest appendage to grasp.  
Unfortunately, the crazed and merciless scientists back at the labs had ben none too friendly when getting the animal from one place to another, pulling unforgivingly at his godforsaken tail or simply grasping at the scruff of his neck roughly where he was practically helpless to fight.  
Lucky for him, both Groot and Drax had seemed to understand Rocket’s wishes to remain untouched as he frantically pulled at his suddenly too tight clothing and course fur which was now falling out by the handfuls.  
“I am Groot.” The booming voice echoed off the metallic walls of the ship, making Rocket flinch and look up to meet his worried gaze, Drax reflecting the same expression.   
“You are safe with us small friend.” Drax said, echoing Groot’s own promise. Although he could have done without the demeaning adjective, Rocket knew that Drax hadn’t meant anything belittling by it, the man’s sorrowful expression saying it all.  
“I know that, it’s my stupid mentality that needs convincing.” He snapped, although he caught the small smile on Drax’s otherwise concerned face as the large man understood the raccoon’s strange way of saying thank you.  
Another tremor shook him and in all honesty, Rocket couldn’t tell if it was the ship receiving another blast from the Halfworld ship or his own shaking body, but seeing the concerned looks on the two other occupants told him that it was most likely the first.  
“We’re taking more damage.” Drax decided, widening his stance as to keep himself upright while Rocket stumbled over to Groot’s leg, grasping the wood for dear life when a larger blast made the cabin jolt sharply to the right.  
He struggled to take another breath when his heart practically leapt into his throat, his chest seizing up when the tremors continued, growing louder and more violent with each separate blast. Rocket clenched his eyes tightly closed, burying his face into the bark of Groot’s leg until the quakes had died down, leaving him to his own body’s shaking. To tell the truth, he could hardly tell the difference as his knees threatened to buckle underneath him.  
But he was certainly thankful that the seemingly never-ending tremors had ended. The three sat there unmoving for a few moments, not making a move lest the blasts start again, catching them off guard. But nothing happened and Rocket wondered if perhaps Quill and Gamora had managed to lose the bastards.  
“Are they gone?” Drax finally asked, turning around to face the door, most likely going to check on the situation for himself when he was thrown to the opposite side of the room, crashing into the wall and sliding to the floor, Groot and Rocket not far behind as the ship lurched.  
Groot had already lifted himself from the floor, reaching to help Rocket onto his own feet and glancing over towards the third occupant. Drax lay unmoving, his face pulled into a pained grimace as a large welt was already beginning to form at the base of his head.  
In any other circumstance, Rocket would probably be laughing at the irony of it seeing as though the large man had knocked him out not too long ago. However the raccoon was now stating wide eyed at the unconscious man with worry as Groot rushed to the man’s side, only pausing when another unfamiliar noise sounded throughout the room. The sound of metal on metal.  
Rocket turned fearfully towards the origin of the sound, his breath hitching when he saw the claw-like metal prongs piercing themselves through the walls of the ship, slowly tearing away the only barrier between himself and the vast void of space, although he already knew that what lay on the other side of the tearing wall was not space anymore, but the Halfworld ship that had somehow attached itself to the Milano, prying away the metal shield.  
Every nerve in his body was telling him to run, get back to the upper deck of the ship where Quill and Gamora were, but his body refused to listen, seizing up as though he were frozen in place. Groot had somehow managed to lift Drax into his arms and held out a hand towards Rocket to grab him as well and take them both to safety, but was halted in his motion when the seemingly indestructible wall of the Milano was torn away, white suited men with masks covering their faces and the all too familiar guns in their hands.  
It took a lot to hurt Groot, gunfire did little to harm him, usually just angering him as the bullets tore through his wood, unfortunately for him, the guns pointed directly towards him were not your usual bullet shooting weaponry. Groot learned this the hard way as he pushed the frozen Rocket behind him and let out an ear shattering roar that was cut short as a plasma blast tore through his chest, sending him stumbling back on himself.  
It was only then that Rocket suddenly found his ability to move again, racing on all fours towards the fallen Groot, grasping his large hand tightly. “Groot!” He shouted frantically, his lip quivering at the thought of losing his friend again.  
Groot’s eyes were still open as he looked to Rocket, lifting his hand to lift himself back up. The blast had torn a hold straight through his chest, a wound that would luckily regenerate with time, but right now the only thing he could think of was getting the raccoon out of there. Opening his hand to sweep Rocket into a protective hold, another blast from the attackers suddenly tore away the chances of that when his now disembodied arm fell to the floor.  
“Grab it now!” One of the men shouted with a muffled voice from under the sleek black masks, pointing with a gloved hand toward the raccoon. Rocket could do nothing but stare back in horror, still clutching the disembodied hand of his friend for dear life.  
An animal like shriek tore its way from his throat as a hand grasped him by the scruff of his neck, forcing a cold metallic collar around his neck as he writhed, lashing out blindly with his claws at the attackers while the other fought to hold onto Groot’s now useless hand.  
“NO!” He cried, sending a chill of panic through Groot who found himself unable to move as he was pelted with more blasts.  
It had all happened so fast after that, Rocket being dragged kicking and screaming by the leash, the useless wooden arm trailing behind him, the raccoon still unwilling to let it go. “No! Please! Let me- Gah!” Rocket choked on his words when a sudden familiar feeling of burning electricity ran throughout his body, causing him to lose hold of his friend’s appendage, his hands flying up to grasp the electric collar that was slowly killing him.  
When the pain finally died away, so did his vision, nothing but black spots and the feeling of numbness taking over his mind. The last thing he saw before losing himself to the darkness was Groot reaching out with his remaining arm, shouting at him a promise that he would somehow be saved. But for the first time since he had met his friend, the promise meant nothing, translating only to the empty phrase of ‘I am Groot.’


	9. Chapter 9

“This is my fault.” Drax said numbly, holding a hand to his forehead. Peter stopped in his frantic pacing to face the man with surprise.  
“This wasn’t your fault, Drax.” Gamora answered, her voice slightly shaken as she made her way over to the tattooed man. But he refused to look up towards her, even as she pulled a chair in front of him to sit in before tending to his wounded head, placing a cold ice-pack to the large welt.  
“I should have protected him!” He almost shouted back, shaking the ship with his volume. Gamora only pursed her lips, knowing she wasn’t about to convince him otherwise until they had Rocket back safe and sound.  
“I am Groot.” The wounded Flora Colossus managed, his voice audibly strained as he sat himself up. Unfortunately, without the raccoon as their translator, no one was able to make out exactly what he was struggling to say, but Peter was pretty sure it ran along the lines of taking the blame for himself.  
The attack had left him utterly mangled, splintered pieces of wood having been strewn about the ship as he struggled to move. No one except Groot himself knew exactly what had happened during the kidnapping of their furred companion, and whatever weapons that the attackers had used had rendered him almost incapable of moving.  
Both an arm and a leg were missing from the large being, the remaining appendages hanging loosely from a few vines that fought to keep them in use. A hole the size of a base-ball had torn its way through the entirety of Groot’s chest, leaving black singe marks that still smoked slightly. Thankfully, the massive creature was capable of regenerating himself rather quickly, Peter recalled Gamora having cut both of Groot’s arms clean off back on Xandar and by the time they had gotten to the Kyln, they were almost grown back entirely.  
The large steaming hole in the creature’s chest had already begun to mend itself, small vines from within the wound intertwining in a web-like formation. In any other circumstance, Peter would have been utterly amazed by his large friend’s enhanced healing ability. Unfortunately, due to their stressful situation, all the pacing Star Lord could do now was hope that Groot’s limbs grew back fast enough to allow him to help in their attack on the Halfworld ship… once they located it that is.  
“Peter?” His head snapped up at Gamora’s voice. She was still sitting across from Drax, helping the large man in keeping the ice pack plastered to his throbbing head. “What are we going to do?” She asked. If Quill hadn’t known better, he would have thought that the ex-assassin was on the verge of tears, but seeing as though he wasn’t feeling in the mood for being stabbed by one of her ever-present weapons, he ignored the wavering in her tone.  
With his head spinning in panic and confusion, Peter had wanted to lash out. Blame someone, anyone. Hell, Groot and Drax had both confessed their own guilt. He wanted to shout at Gamora for asking such a question. He wanted to test out one of Rocket’s many weapons on that freaking scientist that he had allowed onto his ship.  
He wanted nothing more than to yell and shout at everyone for having lost Rocket. But enough sense was left in Peter, reminding him that if he did lash out, nothing would get better. It would get them no closer to saving their lost friend than they already were and he wasn’t about to risk that.  
The attack from the white Halfworld ship had sent the Milano into utter chaos. Lucky for him, Nova had added air-tight doors on board his ship during the restoration. He hadn’t seen the need at the time, but now, seeing as there was a large gaping hole in the side of the Milano, Peter had never been more grateful for the otherwise useless modification. Much to his displeasure, the ship still remained dangerously damaged, leaving them unable to follow the white ship as it took off into the vast empty void of the Galaxy, going who knows where with Rocket in hand.  
“We’re going to get Rocket back.” He said with determination, pursing his lips when Gamora furrowed her brow.  
“And how are we going to do that?” Drax asked, pushing the green woman’s hand away. “We don’t know his location, and the damage to our ship is too dangerous to fly with.” He pointed out angrily.  
“Well that’s just a risk we’re going to have to take then isn’t it?” Quill snapped back. “Rocket’s the plan making guy in this suit and, in case you hadn’t noticed, he isn’t exactly here right now, which means it’s up to us to get him back, got it?” Drax sighed and nodded slowly, holding his head in his large palms.  
Rogers had stood up by now, shifting guiltily from foot to foot. “I would like to help too.” He managed, looking up to the remaining Guardians. Gamora shot him an angry glare before clenching her fists at her sides and taking a deep breath, obviously having the same thoughts of finding one of Rocket’s old explosives to test out but regained her composure in offering Drax the ice pack again.  
“Oh, don’t think we were going to let you off that easily.” Peter said, pointing towards the man accusingly. “This is on your hands and if you think we were just going to let you tag along on our little rescue mission, you’re dead wrong.”  
Rogers had taken another step back, nodding guiltily. “Now I know you turned down that twisted job offer that those bastards offered you, but right now, you’re the only one who has an idea for what we’re up against here. Drax and Groot, you’re our muscle here, so we need you two healed up here okay? Gamora, help Dr. Jekyll on forming a plan.” Quill said, pointing to each member as he spoke.  
“Where are you going?” Drax asked as the Terran turned to leave the room.  
“I’m going to Contact Nova for help.” He announced. “I’m sure Rocket’s been arrested enough times to have some sort of file and get a fleet behind us.” Gamora nodded, pushing herself up out of her chair and over to where Rogers still stood.  
Deciding that no one was planning on killing each other for the time being, Peter made his way back to the cockpit, switching on his communicator and dialing in on Corpsman Dey. Although he did have the line to Nova Prime directly, Dey was peter’s first choice. Despite Prime’s dedication to the Galaxy, her intentions lay mainly with Xandar, often times ignoring Peter’s calls as they weren’t at the top of her list of importance, especially when the damage from Ronan was still being taken care of.  
Dey however had answered a call in the heat of Ronan’s attack, hearing the ‘Star Prince’ out to the end and ultimately convincing the rest of Nova to join the Guardians and Ravangers alike in protecting the planet and galaxy.  
Peter didn’t have to wait long before his call was answered and Dey’s face appeared on the screen in front of him. “Well, isn’t it Star Lord!” The corpsman called out, a teasing smile spreading across his face.  
Unfortunately, Peter’s greeting was not nearly as friendly. “Dey, we need your help out here.” He managed, watching as the smile dropped from the other man’s face, replaced almost instantly with a look of worry and confusion.  
The man had always had a soft spot for the Terran, even when arresting and taking the thief into custody. Despite what the officers were taught in law, Quill’s crimes reflected nothing of his heart and dedication to others. He had even willingly come back to the planet that could have easily arrested him to warn Nova of Ronan’s attack. So when Peter had mentioned needing a favor, Dey was already pulling up files.  
“What’s wrong?” He asked tentatively, listening intently to Peter’s explanation.  
“Rocket’s been taken.”  
…  
The fact that he had woken up to silence was the first thing to alert Rocket that something was wrong. More often than he would have liked, the raccoon often found himself forced awake by the blaring of Quill’s blasted music sounding through the metallic hallways of the ship, the Terran’s off-key voice singing along to the words of ‘Hooked On A Feeling.’  
The second thing that told Rocket that something was most definitely not right was that he couldn’t move. The surface underneath him was cold and severely uncomfortable. He was lying on his back, a position he had almost never slept in due to the sensitivity of his back, which was now sending a dull pain through his shoulder blades. So naturally, wanting to rid himself of the feeling, the groggy raccoon turned over onto his side. Or at least he tried to.  
His eyes flew open as a sudden rush of panic swept throughout his unmoving body, jolting himself fully awake. The metal restraints holding his wrists and ankles pinned to the operation table were locked securely, so tightly so that Rocket feared he would lose circulation entirely as he clenched his numbing hands uselessly.  
His breathing was beginning to pick up rapidly as he looked around the room frantically. The room was stark white, only making Rocket squint in pain as the bright fluorescent light beaming down on him was reflected off of the walls. For all that he could tell, he was alone in the small room and for once, Rocket actually wanted physical contact.  
Something to reassure him that he wasn’t alone. He wanted Groot’s arms wrapped around him in a protective hold. He would even had allowed Drax to stroke his head at this point if it meant that he wouldn’t be alone in this damned room, awaiting the worst.  
For a moment, Rocket had the blissful thought that this was only a dream. A horrible, but escapable nightmare like the ones that had been haunting him for so long. He shut his eyes tightly, clenching his teeth as he tried to wake himself up.  
His surroundings, however, didn’t change when he opened his eyes. The walls remained white, his arms and legs were still pinned painfully to the table, and his breathing was still panicked as he began to hyperventilate. The only thing that had changed after Rocket had come to the realization that he wasn’t dreaming was that the fur on his cheeks and around his eyes had become wet as fearful tears now fell freely from his eyes.  
Despite his growing hatred towards the deafening silence, having wished to himself that Peter could have been there with his damned Walkman, Rocket felt his gut tighten in panic when he heard the familiar sound of a door sliding open behind him.  
Half of the raccoon wanted to strain in turning around to face whoever had just entered the room, but he didn’t dare move, his shaking body held frozen in place and his breath hitching in his throat as he closed his eyes again, wishing it would all just go away.  
But he was not nearly that lucky. A sudden pressure on the top of his head made his eyes snap open, wide with horror as an alarms rang out through his head. The hand was moving, stroking through the course fur on the raccoon’s head. A shiver ran up his spine when he felt a thumb against his right ear, moving methodically against it while the other pressed protectively against his head.  
The torturous feeling in his gut only worsened when the woman above him let out a small chuckle, her hand moving from the top of his head and to his masked face. Rocket clenched his eyes closed tighter when her fingers brushed against his cheeks, stroking at the wet fur, more tears still escaping from the raccoon as he choked on a terrified sob.  
Deciding that he couldn’t take it anymore, Rocket tore his head away from the woman’s hand, wrenching his neck as far as the restraints would allow him to keep from making contact again. “Aw, now don’t be like that.” The sound of the scientist’s voice sending another shiver wracking his body as she raked her fingers through the fur on his neck.  
A growl had made its way out of Rocket’s throat and he glared at the woman angrily. “Don’t touch me you bastard.” He managed, although his throat tightened when another choked sob tried to force its way from him.  
The woman above him stuck out her lip in a mocking pout. “I see you’ve gained quite the vocabulary since we last saw each other.” She said, not taking her hand from his neck as though to prove her position in the situation. “Now, we were hoping you’d be out for a while longer until we could finished our first procedure, but we’ll have to do without that luxury.” The woman finished, finally removing her intrusive hand from the raccoon’s neck to flip through the papers on her clip-board.  
Rocket swallowed uneasily at the mention of a procedure and tugged subconsciously at the restraints on his wrists as he tried to curl in on himself. Flashes of electric surges running through his small body and countless sharp tools cutting and tearing at his paper thin skin. A sharp pain in his chest brought him back into reality and he let out a bark of surprise, looking down to see the woman prodding at the implants on his chest.  
He had been stripped of his orange jumpsuit while unconscious, taking away the loaded gun he had had strapped to him and the various explosives in the small pockets, being analyzed by curious scientists no doubt. He hated the feeling of his exposed implants and scarred skin, of course, the fabric scratching against his sensitive skin hadn’t been all that comfortable, it had given him a sense of security, just one less thing for people to gawk at.  
He sucked in a painful breath when the woman pushed roughly against one of the implants, causing his heart to skip a beat. “Well, I don’t know how you managed, but your cybernetics are in perfect condition.” She said, ignoring as the raccoon’s shaky chest wriggled under her hand.  
“Wonderful.” Rocket choked out, a hint of his usual sarcasm making its way into his otherwise panicking thoughts. To tell the truth, Rocket’s implants had almost never been in ‘perfect condition.’ Rubble and debris managing its way into the metal plugs.  
He remembered the first time he had complications with the metal in his back and chest. It had been months after his escape, only weeks after having met Groot when the pain in his chest had caused him to fall unceremoniously from his seat. Groot hadn’t wasted a minute in getting him to a hospital, much to Rocket’s disapproval as he snapped his teeth at the doctors and their syringes.  
The implants had remained neglected in cleaning and maintenance for too long, causing an infection that, without Groot and, to Rocket’s displeasure, the doctors’ quick thinking, would have otherwise killed him. Since then, Rocket had made sure to keep his implants cleaned and covered with the fabric of clothing to keep away debris and contamination. Even Groot helped him when the implants became infected.  
“That’s more like it.” The woman said, ignoring the obvious sarcasm in the raccoon’s tone. “You know, it’s taken a lot of work to find you 89P13.” She added, turning around to grab something off of the table behind Rocket where he couldn’t see. Not that he needed to in order to know that it was a syringe.  
“That is not my name!” He snapped, pulling frantically against the restraints again when he caught the sight of the scientist pulling the plastic tip off of the large needle.  
The woman only let out a hum of consideration before turning back to the raccoon. “You may have created a new title for yourself over the past few years, but you’re forgetting something, subject.” Rocket had barely been able to see what the scientist was doing before he let out a wail of panic and pain, another wave of tears falling from his eyes and soaking into his fur as she thrust the long needle into his restrained arm. A choked sob tore from his throat as the blood was pulled from his arm and into the syringe, filling quickly with the red liquid. “We own you.”


	10. Chapter 10

“And you’re sure it’s them?” Dey asked. He had made contact with Nova Prime who had passed all information, as well as the forces they’d need in order to take down the lost Halfworld ship. Within twenty minutes of having received Peter’s distress call, they were met by one of the larger Nova ships, docking the tattered Milano below where it could be repaired later.  
Drax and Groot had been lead off to the medical hold almost instantly, both complaining and griping the whole way, or simply saying ‘I am Groot’ in a slightly distressed tone in the tree-man’s case as he was practically dragged away from the cockpit of their own ship and on board the next. Gamora and Rogers however had stayed at Peter’s side to meet with Dey.  
Peter nodded, although to be honest, he wasn’t sure that he was actually all too sure about it himself. The guardians had taken the last few hours to try and come up with a plan, although seeing as though their official ‘plan maker’ wasn’t with them, they found that even coming up with twelve percent of a plan was proving difficult for the band of misfits as well as the Nova officers.  
“Gamora said she was able to get a read on the make of the technology used on the ship and which sector it could have come from, and you said so yourself, it’s the only uncharted ship in that part of the quadrant.” He argued, shifting uneasily when Dey frown, obviously unconvinced. Peter let out a sigh of defeat, dropping his head heavily into the palms of his hands  
“Listen man, I know how much of a burden this is coming from Nova, especially if we don’t have an exact location on these psychopaths, but I am begging you Dey, I need your help. We can’t just leave Rocket out there and if this is all we have to go on, then I’m going to have to ask you to take that chance with me.” He explained, his voice wavering with worry and exhaustion from it all.  
The Nova officer stared back in what could almost have been perceived as shock at Star Lord’s words. “Quill, after what you did for Xandar, for the galaxy, the least we can do in repayment is to get one of the Guardian’s back.” He assured him, looking towards Gamora who only stared down at the table as though nothing either of the two men had said had affected her in any way.  
If nothing else, at least the warrior’s vast knowledge of ships and their origins had been one good thing to come from her time in alliance with Thanos. She recalled countless missions including her need to move about as one of the crowd, often times meaning that she had to steal one of the local crafts. Along with having to teach herself the internal mechanics of how to drive each of the ships, it soon became almost natural to her in identifying the makes of the ships as well.  
Her eyes flickered up from where they had been staring down at the table to glance at Rogers. The man had remained quiet the entire time while on the Nova ship, simply trailing behind her and Peter as they left to meet with Corpsman Dey.  
She was no less furious at the man, nor was he any less guilty of getting Rocket captured in the first place, however, the more she studied him, the more she began to sympathize with the former scientist. It had come to her attention after she had been forced to working with the man at Peter’s request that Rogers really had meant no harm to their friend in the situation. Despite the fact that he was guilty of causing Rocket yet another panic attack, as well as getting captured by the Halfworld fugitives, the guilt stricken look he wore now had brought something out of he that she didn’t know she would ever be able to feel with another. Compassion.  
The green skinned woman had been taken by Thanos at such a young age, crying and kicking the whole way, tears streaming down her face as her dead and bloodied parents were left behind her. And he had shown her no mercy since then. Within her first week with the tyrant, the majority of Gamora’s skeleton had been replaced with cybernetics, the thin metal sheets shining through her cheekbones were a constant reminder to her permanent surgeries.  
Over the years, Gamora had been tortured, enhanced, and trained to kill. And that was exactly what she did once Thanos had given her her first mission. Kill.  
And she had killed so many since then, not even wincing upon hearing the pleas of her victims before she plunged her knife through their chests, leaving their families to grieve, just as she had for her own. And maybe that was why it had never bothered her. Maybe that was why she never questioned why she was being sent to kill. Because she wanted everyone else to feel the same pain she did. She knew she wouldn’t have been able to kill Thanos himself, so she killed others instead, for the sake of having someone understand her pain, even if it meant them wanting to kill her in the end.  
After having joined the Guardians, that pain was replaced with something else, guilt. So much guilt that it had often times kept Gamora lying awake at night her entire frame shaking as the screams rang throughout her head.  
Looking at Rogers in that moment, it was as though he were mirroring those same emotions back at her. Guilt ridden and full of fear. It was in that moment that Gamora decided that she was done blaming Rocket’s capture on the man and instead focus on more pressing matters, like finding their smaller partner and destroying those who stood in her way.  
She took a deep breath through the nose upon the thought as the faint adrenaline rush from the sudden lust for blood filled her mind once again, the only difference now that almost spread a faint smile across her face was that this time, Gamora wasn’t going to kill to rid herself for her own pain, she would kill for Rocket’s.  
…  
Rocket’s breathing had become limited to gasping for air between his constant screaming that had already torn his throat raw. His countless pleas for the pain to stop had done nothing in terms of his torture as more and more scientist began to pile into the room, many of which he had recognized from his previous days in that Halfworld prison.  
It hadn’t been long after the first syringe was filled with the raccoon’s crimson blood that the doors had slid open again, two males in those stark white lab coats that he had grown to hate so much. He had hardly finished in his surprised and pain induced shouts when the needle in his numbing arm was replaced with another.  
His back arched off of the metal table as he tried to fill his lungs with air again, only losing his ability to breathe again, a choked yelp of panic tearing itself from his trembling body. He closed his eyes tightly when the harsh light swinging high above him was suddenly blocked by the two men who had just entered the room, leaning curiously over the breathless animal with looks of shock and amusement.  
“Bet you thought you’d seen the last of us rat.” He heard one of the men say, and quite loudly at that as Rocket’s ears began to ring. Of course it hadn’t helped in terms of pain when he felt the sudden pressure of a hand on his chest picking almost absentmindedly at the implants.  
“Gah! Stop! Please!” He had barely began to register that it had been his own voice shouting before a heavy force sent his head snapping to the side, hitting the table as it did so. Rocket’s eyes blinked open rapidly in shock, trying to raise a paw to where the hand had hit his still tear soaked cheek were they not both restrained.  
“You’d do well to keep your mouth shut rodent, you’ve caused us enough trouble as it is.” The voice made Rocket’s ears fly back so that they pinned against his head as the man leaned down, too close for comfort.  
He had lost track of what the other two occupants in the room were doing as the pain returned to his chest, the man above him toying with his implants once again out of plain spite. Rocket bit his lip this time to keep himself from crying out, wincing when his sharp teeth drew blood as it pierced his skin, but it was almost nothing in comparison to the pain erupting in his heaving chest.  
His vision had become rather blurry as his head buzzed with the sudden amounts of pain erupting in his system, but he was still able to make out what the figures gathered around him were doing as they began removing what could only be surgical tools as well as a tightly wound roll of black and red wires from one of the men’s briefcases and setting them on the table.  
The man standing directly above him had yet to remove his hands from Rocket’s implants and by the look of amusement on his face, it didn’t seem to the raccoon that had was planning on the motion anytime soon. The pain had dulled itself into a consistent dull throbbing, making his body spasm every few seconds as a nerve was struck wrong. He didn’t know exactly how his cybernetics worked seeing as though the scientists tended to experiment first, explain never, but he was almost positive that they were connected to his spinal cord, meaning that in terms of pain, the electric pulses ran throughout his entire system.  
A garbled yelp escaped through his bloodied lips as an especially painful spasm jolted his chest. He arched his back off of the table again, only pressing further into the man’s grasp as he did so, pulling another ear shattering scream from his violently shuddering body.  
“Stop! Stop!” He was cut off by another strike across the face, but the pressure that had been seizing his chest and keeping him from breathing had been lifted as the hand was removed to hit the creature once again. He took a large gasping breath, relishing in the short-lived yet beautiful feeling of air filling his lungs. His heart was pounding so rapidly in his chest that Rocket was sure that were it not cybernetically enhanced, it would have simply burst.  
“W-why are you doing this?” He managed through short breaths, his eyes fluttering with dizziness. He flinched away from the man as he leaned down closer to the raccoon, his hot breath blowing on his tear soaked fur as he spoke.  
“What, you didn’t miss us?” He said mockingly, taking advantage of the raccoon’s position to ran a hand over Rocket’s face as though to wipe away the tears streaming down his face. Rocket pulled away as much as his restraints would allow him, trying to refrain from biting the man’s fingers as they stroked his cheekbone.  
A shudder ran up the raccoon’s spine, but whether it was from the man’s soft chuckling or the woman pulling a surgical mask over her face, he couldn’t tell. What he did know was that breathing was about to become a lot harder as the third figure in the room, the one that had remained silent, pulled a scalpel from their metallic tray of surgical tools.  
“We’ve been looking for you across the entire Galaxy for years now, and now that we’ve got you back, we’re going to make sure we never lose you again.” Rocket wasn’t exactly sure who it was talking now, all three of the figures in the room had pulled on their surgical masks and his head was swimming with the voices of the present as well as those horrific memories of his past so that they seemed to warp together.  
He did, however, hear when one of the many voices, so much louder than the rest called down to him at the same moment that the metallic scalpel was placed at the base of his collarbone. “There is no escape. Chip him.” And his world exploded with pain.


	11. Chapter 11

Rogers stared back at Peter in shock. “You want me to what?” He asked incredulously, furrowing his eyebrows at the younger man who only stared back intently, shrugging his shoulders and pursing his lips.  
It was Gamora that actually answered him seeing as though Star Lord himself wasn’t too keen on their small percentage of a plan. “If we can get you onto that ship, we’ll have an inside eye on the situation.” She explained, clasping her green hands together tightly with unease.  
It wasn’t the plan itself that shocked Rogers, in fact, it seemed rather genius to get someone to pose as one of the kidnappers on the Halfworld ship. What shocked him was the fact that they wanted him carrying out the rescue mission. The man who had been involved in the torture of the poor creature for all of those years. It boggled his mind. And by the way the others kept avoiding his gaze, it didn’t seem as though they were all too keen on the idea either.  
“Listen.” Peter started, leaning forward in his seat and ignoring the glare that Gamora shot towards him. “We don’t like this plan any more than you do.”  
“I believe that I like it less than him.” The tattooed one stated plainly, his hand still holding the ever present ice pack to the enormous welt at the base of his head.  
“So why don’t you go in?” He asked. As much as he wanted to prove himself to the raccoon, he knew very well how little of a chance he had in doing so when dressed in those damned white lab coats once again.  
“Because I’m going to be busy hacking their ship’s mainframe.” He explained, gesturing to the holographic map that had been pulled up in front of them, curtesy of Nova. “At the moment, we’ve got the ship traced back to a planet in this sector.” He continued, pointing towards the right corner of the map and enlarging the picture so that the specific area was now the prime focus. “We’ve already got Nova to contact the three planets in the area and, according to Gamora’s intuition, the make of this thing doesn’t conserve its fuel well, meaning that it’s going to have to land at some point.”  
“And the moment it does, we’ll be notified of its position right away.” Gamora added, smiling towards the blue clad corpsman who stood silently behind them.  
Rogers knew that he was there to help in getting the Guardian’s smallest partner back, and he was thankful for that seeing as though without the Nova forces, doing so would be nearly impossible. However, the unnerving glares the man kept giving him was less than comforting.  
“After that, you and I are getting ourselves in where Gamora and I will work on hacking into the ship’s mainframe to keep it from lifting off again, and you will find us Rocket using your know how of the Halfworld psychos and alert us once you pinpoint his location.” Peter added, gesturing towards the four behind him, the tree man with a still half grown arm and leg nodding back in agreement and giving Rogers a look that he knew meant that if anything went wrong, the seemingly gentle giant wouldn’t remain gentle for long.  
“Keep us posted on board the ship using these.” Gamora said, holding out two earpieces, curtesy of Nova no doubt. Seeing as though Green skin was unfortunately too conspicuous, Gamora was to stay on the Nova ship along with the rest of the team despite her vast knowledge of the ship’s interior and mechanics. “Once you’re in and Peter has the ship disabled, we’ll be able to get in.” She finished, gesturing to Drax and Groot who only stared down at the hologram in front of them as though they would actually catch sight of the raccoon if they looked hard enough.  
It was absolutely astonishing how much of an impact the escaped raccoon had made on these people, and by the sound of it, the galaxy itself seeing as though Nova had gotten itself involved in the matter. Despite the fact that he shouldn’t have made it more than a week on his own, it seemed as though Rocket, as he now went by, had created an entirely new life for himself.  
He had friends now, people willing to risk their own lives to save him. People who cared enough to chase him through the streets of some unknown planet to save him from a panic attack. And, because of Rogers, he was back in his own personal Hell.  
The guilt was unbearable. The seizing of his stomach every time the creature was brought up, only knowing that he was the cause of all this. That he had been the one to lead the Halfworld fugitives to their escaped subject. And the mention of panic attacks and nightmares only made his blood boil with anger. He had willingly put the poor creature through so much pain, so much torture that Rocket had been horribly scarred mentally. The constant fear of his past causing him to cut himself off from the people he considered friends.  
Rogers was pulled out of his musings when the sound of the Nova officer’s handheld device began to beep incisively. “We’ve got coordinates.” He stated plainly before making his way over to the main console of the ship where a few other corpsmen stood. They didn’t hesitate for a second before plugging in whatever coordinates were displayed on the device and into the ship’s navigational system.  
Gamora stood, hooking one of the earpieces over her own ear and tossing the other to Rogers who quickly followed suit. Peter seemed to already have a larger one over his own right ear and was already readying himself, tucking his Taser gun into his belt.  
“Alright Doc. We’re up.” He said, practically yanking the man out of his seat as they made their way towards the observation deck. The ship had already been moving in the general sector that the Halfworld ship had landed in, meaning that their journey to the planet in specific wouldn’t take much longer.  
He was caught off guard when the Nova officer began to speak again. “Alright, Quill, contact Gamora the moment you reach the mechanical system, and you.” The corpsman pointed at Rogers, tossing a wad of white fabric towards him. The former scientist stumbled back in surprise as the man glared down at him. “Don’t mess this up. Let us know when you find Rocket and get him the hell out of there.” He said flatly.  
“Dey.” Gamora called the man back over to where she and the other officers stood, much to Rogers’ relief. The officer gave him one last distrustful look before making his way to the woman’s side.  
“Might want to put that on.” Peter stated blankly, gesturing to the object in his grasp. He glared down at the ball of wadded fabric in his hands and furrowed his eyebrows in confusion before unfurling it, almost dropping it as he did. “Gotta play the part.” Peter shrugged, pulling on his own white lab coat and making his way back towards where the others were all crowded, staring out of the front window towards where the small and somewhat familiar white ship was growing closer.  
…  
He was attached to the machine again, the red and black wires securely fastened to his metal implants and the sound of electricity building up already crackling behind him. He was laying on his stomach now, the wires protruding from his chest making him try and arch his body off of the metal table to ease himself of this pain.  
His breathing had not slowed for a second and the pounding of his heart was now beating so rapidly that Rocket couldn’t tell if it was even still pounding or if it had simply seized up completely. There were more people in the room now and his head swam with dizziness after enduring the countless needles that had punctured his cut and bloodied skin, injecting who knows what into his bloodstream.  
He had recognized most of the people in the room, and by the menacing smiles and torturous experiments, it seemed as though they hadn’t forgotten their little creation either.  
“Well, isn’t it 89P13.” One of the men said, his voice practically dripping with malice as he leaned down so that Rocket was forced to look directly at him. He had pulled down his mask so that he could see the man’s toothy grin.  
The raccoon instantly recognized the man despite the fact that he had acquired a pair of round glasses and a large amount of gray hair since the last time he had seen him. Although usually, the man was behind him at the machine, tampering with the dials as though the subject on the table was nothing more than some puppet controlled by the surges of electricity.  
Rocket had to resist the urge to snap at his fingers as he reached a latex covered hand towards Rocket’s cheek as though to pet him, knowing that it would only get him in deeper trouble than he already was, although that didn’t stop him from yanking his head away from the man’s touch. Not that it did much good seeing as though he was still restrained on the table and the sudden jolt only made the plugs burying in his chest dig deeper.  
He let out a pain stricken yelp and another when the man’s hand moved from his head to the wires on his back, tugging on them as though to make sure they were secured to the implants, only sending another bolt of pain through his trembling body.  
“Aw, we’ve missed you here fella.” The man said in a calm tone. Although his voice only made Rocket want to pull away again, which he would have had the man not been gripping the wires still, holding him firmly in place. “It’s been downright lonely without our favorite subject.”  
Rocket couldn’t help but let out a forced laugh upon hearing this. “Yeah right.” He managed through shaky breaths. “I’m your only subject you sick bastard.” It was supposed to have been proof that the scientists had yet to break him had he not been cut off when one of the chords protruding from his back was suddenly yanked on, pulling at one of his implants as it did so.  
“Haha!” The suddenly much louder voice of the man next to him made Rocket cringe, squeezing his eyes tightly shut as his already wavering headache only worsened. “I see you’ve still got a bit of spirit left in you.” He said, letting the wire in his hand fall to the floor. “Don’t worry, we’ll get that taken care of right away and then everything can get right back to normal.”  
Rocket felt his stomach clench at the words, his eyes snapping open to stare at the man furiously. “You’ll never break me.” He seethed, his sharp teeth bared and ready to snap at whatever came within range.  
The scientist raised his dark eyebrows in mock interest, pursing his lips and leaning in even closer toward the restrained animal. “And why’s that?” He asked, his tone suddenly much more serious, making Rocket’s breath hitch in his throat before regaining composure… or what composure he could possibly muster at this point.  
“Because I’m not alone this time.” He spat. “They’ll come for me. They will!” He shouted, pulling against the metal cuffs around his wrists as though they would suddenly break.  
“And why would they do that?”  
Rocket’s glare only hardened more as a burst of hope began to take over, adrenaline rushing through his veins. “Because they’re my friends and I-“  
“No they’re not.”  
The raccoon froze, his mouth still open from having been interrupted in his rant. He didn’t know why, but the words had struck him deep, causing him to furrow his brows in confusion. “No, they are. They’re coming to get me, and they’ll kill you. They’ll kill all of you.” He stated angrily, although his confidence was suddenly wavering for some reason unknown.  
“And why is that? Do you they even know what you are?” The man asked, he had stood up at some point during Rocket’s panicked explanation so that Rocket could no longer see his face as he towered over the tethered animal.  
Rocket didn’t answer. He didn’t know how to answer. Sure they knew he was genetically modified, but so was Gamora, what difference was there? But there was more to it than that and for whatever reason, Rocket’s head was suddenly swimming with panic again.  
“Do they know that you’re nothing but an experiment gone wrong? That you will never be capable of trusting anyone because you’re afraid. Afraid they’ll betray you. Afraid they’ll turn away from you the moment they find out just how broken you are.”  
Rocket had stopped breathing all together. His eyes were shut tightly and his teeth were clenched as he tried to hold back the tears. “You’re lying!” He shouted, a sob wracking his body. “They wouldn’t do that!”  
“Wouldn’t we?”  
Rocket’s eyes snapped open upon hearing the familiar voice and his stomached did a flip when he saw who had replaced the old man.  
“Peter?” But he was cut off when a sudden bolt of electricity seized his entire being.  
…  
Rocket was jolted awake by his own terrified screaming. Even in his own personal hell, the nightmares still haunted him, proving that things could only get worse. He hadn’t recalled ever falling asleep, although by the immense pain throbbing throughout his small shuddering body, he had decided that he had passed out sometime during the operation.  
His eyes snapped open at the memory, his hand, no longer restrained by those damned cuffs, touched the fur over his tender collarbone. He felt tears building up in his eyes as he stared up at the ceiling of his cage, biting his lower lip to keep from crying out as he felt the pain shoot through his neck. The messy stitches closing the wound had obviously been done carelessly as he felt numbly at the halfhazardly sewn knots holding the bloodstained skin together.  
Despite the pain coursing through him as his small fingers ran impassively over his bloody wound, the matted fur sticky with the stuff, Rocket bit back a cry of panic as reality began to creep back upon him. Even though he had fallen unconscious sometime during the implant, he knew exactly what was now buried inside him.  
There truly was no escaping now. No chance of leaving this place for good like he thought he had all those years ago. He had thought he was safe. After all those years of trusting none other than Groot in fear of being taken back again, he had found a family. He had finally let go of his fears of being taken back after the Guardians had officially banded together in Quill’s ship.  
Unfortunately, the Guardians could only do so much as Rocket’s mysterious past snuck back up on him, tearing him away from his new life, his friends… his family in one fell swoop. And if Rocket was being honest with himself, he couldn’t tell what he was more afraid of. That the others wouldn’t come for him, leaving him to face what he had hoped were only memories and nightmares. Or that they would.  
He had finally calmed his harsh breathing down since waking up from his nightmare, yet Quill’s face had yet to disappear from his mind. He knew it was only a dream, that Quill had never worn that damned lab coat and electrocuted him, watching him spasm involuntarily as the voltage surged through his body.  
But until just a few days ago, he was sure that being taken back to Halfworld had only been a nightmare too. And yet here he was, laying in the corner of a cage, picking at the stiches from the operation that had left him with a tracking chip in his neck.  
Rocket wasn’t one that the other Guardians had ever gotten close to in terms of their relationships with the exception of Groot, and it was no secret that they probably would never reach that point with the aggressive raccoon. However, Rocket did trust them. He trusted them with his life in fact.  
So much so that even the thought of the Guardians coming for him brought out a whimper from his shaking form. Because as much as he trusted the others to come looking for him, guns held high and knives gleaming in the harsh white light of the facility, he knew with all his being that his trust in them would be torn away just as quickly.  
They would see him for what he really was in his weakened state. Nothing.  
He was nothing but a lab experiment, he wasn’t even meant to have survived through what tests they had put him through. The team didn’t need him. Hell, all he had done for them in the past few days was make them pin him down as his fake aggressive behavior slowly deteriorated.  
He was weak. And he was useless. But most of all, Rocket was broken.


	12. Chapter 12

The white lab coat made Roger’s skin crawl to the point where he had almost considered taking it off altogether and disposing of it had Quill not been walking directly behind him, shifting in his own disguise uncomfortably.  
The Nova ship had landed not far away, allowing both of the infiltrating men to get off and make their way over the white Halfworld ship. A shiver ran up Rogers’ spine upon seeing the men and women talking in front of the aircraft, most of which he had recognized as fugitives from the Nova attack all those years ago.  
Boxes were being hauled up the steps and into the ship, most likely full of new torture devices for their reacquired subject back onboard. Peter furrowed his eyebrows and hurried in his pace toward the side of the ship, Rogers trailing not far behind.  
The thing was larger than Rogers had expected a Halfworld ship to be and quite frankly, he wasn’t sure how easy it would be to find the missing raccoon with all the space. The windows of the craft were tinted so that he couldn’t see in, taking away all chances of him pinpointing Rocket’s location from outside.  
He gritted his teeth nervously. They had no doubt already began their sick experiments on the creature. Memories of the raccoon’s pleas and heart wrenching screams rang throughout his head, knowing that the scientists in that room with him would show little to no mercy now that their creation was back in their grasp.  
It was one thing to have lasted as long as he did under the experiments Rocket had been put under, especially seeing as though none of the other subjects had survived as he had. But the fact that the cybernetically enhanced raccoon had escaped the facility and kept himself alive for years afterwards was another feat in itself that Rogers knew the other scientists wouldn’t overlook.  
He was brought out of his musings upon hearing the unpleasant sound of metal grating on metal as Peter unscrewed the large fuel nozzle from its place in the ship’s gas tank. “What are you doing?” He asked in a harsh yet quiet voice, the Halfworlders were still making their way to and from the ship and being where they were, any amount of noise could give away their position.  
“Making sure these guys aren’t going anywhere for a while.” Peter replied, pulling out the large nozzle from the hold in the side of the white ship and dropping it entirely, allowing the contents to spill onto the ground at their feet. “Come on, we need to get inside.” He added, stepping over the increasingly large puddle of fuel on the hard concrete and waving for Rogers to follow.  
“How are we supposed to get in?” Rogers asked, gathering the white material in his hands so the lab coat wouldn’t drag through the oil as he caught up to the second man who had pressed himself against the side of the ship. The former scientist followed suit, peering around the edge of their hiding place to see three men standing guard the ship whilst the others simply made their way to and from the large craft, carrying boxes of varying sizes.  
“Well Doc, seeing as though we don’t exactly have the identification to get in, I suggest we grab one of those weird crates and try to fake our way in.” Peter answered sarcastically, gesturing to where a large pile of the wooden boxes were still stacked.  
“And you really think that’s going to work?” Rogers asked incredulously.  
Peter answered with a shrug. “It’s a work in progress, like I said, Rocket’s usually the one with the plans, not me.” He said, obviously trying to lighten the mood, but the worry in his voice and the flickering of his gaze from the boxes to the ominous ship behind him.  
Rogers pursed his lips. “Little guy’s really made a lot more of an impact than I thought.” He admitted, watching cautiously when peter turned to him.  
“How so?” He asked, almost warily.  
Rogers took a tentative step back, wincing when he felt the puddle of oil under his boot, suddenly wishing he hadn’t spoken at all. He took a deep breath before continuing. “Well, to be honest, I didn’t even think he would have survived this long being raised in captivity and all, let alone have created an entirely new life for himself.” He managed, avoiding eye contact and staring at the boxes ahead of them as they slowly disappeared one by one.  
He was surprised when Peter let out a chuckle. “Yeah, can’t say I had been expecting to have been almost taken out by a talking raccoon the first time I met him… well I guest he did take me out, but then we got arrested so everything’s good now.” He laughed again upon seeing Roger’s blank expression. “Rocket and Groot used to be bounty hunters. At least I think they were… all I know is that I was shoved in a sack at one point.” He finished, smiling as though it were some happy memory.  
Rogers wasn’t exactly sure how to respond to that. It was obvious that the former subject meant a lot to the rest of the team, but he still couldn’t pin point what it was that made them so protective, not that he would have ever mentioned it out loud out of fear that he would most likely be killed in the worst possible way.  
“Okay, when I say the word, we run over there and grab one of those boxes. Got it?” Peter interrupted Roger’s thoughts, turning around to face him again before gesturing to the pile of supplies. The former scientist nodded, eyeing the other men and women loading the cargo on board.  
“Good, let’s go.” And to Rogers’ dismay, Peter took off, racing faster than anyone in a full length lab coat should have ever been able to towards the crates. With one last look towards the oblivious Halfworlders, he too followed in making his way hurriedly towards the pile of cargo, stopping only to give a disgruntled glare towards the man who had already gathered a crate in his arms and was working on prying the top open.  
“I was hoping for a little more of a warning.” He whispered harshly. Peter only waved him off halfheartedly, pulling a small knife from his coat pocket to help him in prying the top off the box. “What are you doing?”  
“I want to see exactly what we’re bringing onto this thing before we get in.” He stated plainly, grunting when the lid was finally pried from its place atop the container.  
“It’s just supplies, even evil scientists need to eat.” Rogers assured him, turning back to the ship and grabbing a box of his own, jostling about the contents as though to prove a point, although, the substances inside did seem a tad metallic for any type of food he had ever seen.  
Peter’s face, however, disproved his theory. “You were saying?” He questioned angrily, his eyes stone cold and his lip turned up in a look of disgust. The box was filled with syringes and liquids of varying colors, and if his hunch was correct, Rogers’ box held matching contents.  
“I swear, when I get my hands on those bastards…” He trailed off, his hand reaching for the Taser gun hidden under his bulky lab coat.  
Rogers took a step away, making sure the box was still securely in his grasp and that none of the other celebrating Halfworlders had spotted them. “And you will, but for now.” He gestured to the ship, watching as Peter’s fury melted into determination.  
“Never thought I’d say this Doc. But you’re right. Let’s go.” He managed, spilling the tubes and chemicals out of the crate and onto the ground before slapping the lid back into place before taking the lead once again, ignoring the broken glass as his boots smashed it further into the concrete.  
Getting on board the ship was, to Rogers’ surprise, very easy. Then again, seeing as though they had only just gotten their creation back into their hands, he could see that the pure vengeful celebration filling the air had left the fugitives rather off guard.  
“Okay.” Peter whispered over, tossing his empty crate unceremoniously into the corner of the hallway, which was now empty as most of the workers had been called into a separate section of the ship. “I’ll head to the control room and work with Gamora on getting this hunk of junk disabled.” He stated plainly before pursing his lips. “Find Rocket and make sure to let the others know the second you do. Just don’t blow your cover until I can make sure this thing doesn’t get airborne anytime soon.”  
Rogers nodded in understanding, dropping his own crate and taking off in the opposite direction as Peter. The facility wasn’t the same as the one back on Halfworld, but the layout of the thing was rather familiar as he made his way down the hallways.  
He didn’t know how long exactly he had been walking before he noticed something was most definitely wrong until the sound of the main opening began to close and frantic scientists began to push their ways past him and towards some unknown threat.  
At first, he had thought that Peter had somehow already managed to override the system. That is until he saw one man in particular carrying one of those oh so familiar metallic leashes as he ran past. Rogers hadn’t even realized that he was running until he nearly crashed into one of the crowding scientists that had gathered to watch the scene unfold.  
The man furrowed his brow in confusion before following her gaze towards where the man with the leash was wrangling a particular thrashing raccoon.  
His hand went to the side of his head immediately, pressing the button of the earpiece. “I found him.” He managed before being pushed into the room by the gathered scientists. He froze and felt his stomach drop as the frantic and crying subject was brought to the table.  
…  
Rocket had himself pressed up against the back of the cage, wishing that he could somehow fade through the cold metal and get away from the hands that were reaching toward him. Unfortunately, neither luck nor fate were on him side as one of the white gloved hands grasped his ringed tail and jerked him from his position in the cage and back into the blinding light.  
He felt an animal like yelp escape his mouth when his head hit the floor, sending a wave of dizziness and nausea through his trembling body. He was so disoriented in fact, that he had hardly noticed when the grip moved from pulling at his aching tail to the scruff of his neck, carrying him through the hallways like a puppy that had done something wrong.  
“Please don’t do this.” He pleaded, his voice breaking when the man’s grip only tightened at the base of his neck. He knew he going to get anywhere by pleading, it never had in the past and no one in the facility seemed too keen on allowing their little creation to forget exactly where he belonged, but the shouting and pleading for help was better than doing nothing at all.  
His collar was still hurting from the surgery and the man’s grip only pulled on the half-assed stitches more, sending an excruciating pain through the raccoon as he writhed I his grasp, trying to free himself from further pain. He didn’t stop struggling, despite the fact that it did nothing in terms of relieving himself of the latex covered hand at the back of his neck and the blood that was once again staining his fur crimson red as his thrashing tore open the stitches.  
He didn’t care. It was past the point of evading pain and on the verge of pure panic as his claws unsheathed themselves, digging up and into the hand holding him. Of course, seeing as though the man holding him had been expecting such a gesture, he was immediately switched in his grasp to the next hand. Shaking the animal rather roughly as he inspected the three red marks raked across his wrist.  
“You’re not getting away again that easily.” The man assured him, tightening his grip even more to further his point. Rocket cringed at the throbbing pain as he felt bruises already beginning to form but bit his tongue to keep from crying out, resigning to hanging limply from the gloved hand.  
Rocket gritted his teeth when he felt another damn tear fall from his face and onto the white tiled flooring. He hated crying, absolutely hated it. Crying was a sign weakness. And Rocket was not weak. Hell, he could have blown up the entire ship if he had only been given the time. At least that was what he told himself.  
Rocket was not weak. Rocket was a snarky, over the top, trigger happy and aggressive creature and absolutely no amount of fear could break him. Mainly because Rocket had no fear. Unfortunately for him, there was a second half to the raccoon that had had hoped was destroyed long ago. Pushed back into the far reaches of his mind, never to be uncovered again.  
But subject 89P13 still existed.  
The cybernetically enhanced, one of a kind, psychologically and physically tortured monster was already broken, leaving Rocket to picking up the pieces, shoving them back into the corners of his memory, often times opening fresh wounds only to be covered and pressed back further with the mask of anger and aggression.  
It hadn’t been much of a problem when it was just him and Groot. The tree man had grown used to his partner’s sudden bursts of fury, usually staying quiet and allowing Rocket to vent, allowing him to scratch small claw marks into his bark when he tried to comfort him. The raccoon was never one for touch or admitting the fact that he did in fact have his weaknesses, but Groot was always there for him. Never judging the animal as vermin of some escaped freak that he so feared he was and allowing the raccoon to open up on his own terms, which he did.  
But then the others came along, and the Guardians of the Galaxy were formed, and of course, everything just had to go awry. The guardians had started out as colleagues. Well, Quill had started as bounty, but that was beside the point. The truth of the matter was that since he hadn’t expected the relationship between the five to go anywhere besides blasting a couple holes through a man’s head and collecting the units for that damned rock, he had treated them like every other pedestrian or commoner on the streets.  
He pushed them away, resorting to snide comments and guns to the head because that was how he functioned. Rocket didn’t need anyone, and he sure as hell didn’t want anyone worrying over him because he had no weakness. He had nothing for anyone to worry about. That was his charade. That was the cover he hid behind so often, trying to make it his own.  
And when the Guardians became an actual family, all he could think of to do was to continue to hide behind that cover, hold that mask closer than ever as though it would somehow become real because he knew that that was how they saw him. They saw Rocket as the strong willed, plan making, bite-your-fingers-off-if-you-try-to-pet-him and slightly psychotic raccoon.  
So when he woke himself from nightmares and Groot wasn’t there to comfort him as he usually did, seeing as though he was still in his pot, Rocket began to realize how far his façade had gotten out of hand.  
Because Rocket didn’t have nightmares, he didn’t need someone to sit by him and tell him that everything was alright. Which was why he often found himself not sleeping at all, resorting to staying up, tinkering with his guns and mechanics fruitlessly until the others awoke, pretending he had slept the whole night through right alongside them.  
He pushed back, because he knew that the Guardians had recruited Rocket. They had recruited the raccoon who didn’t give a damn what anyone else thought. And that if they found out just what a broken mess he truly was, they would leave him. That was what the majority of his night terrors faded into. Releasing him from his tortured memories and instead taking a turn for the darker and unknowing future.  
The raccoon was shocked out of his thoughts when he was jostled rather roughly as the man towing him turned a corner, making his way to the ominous door at the end of the hallway.  
Rocket’s breath hitched in his throat as he realized that they had reached their destination, and whatever lay beyond those doors could only have gotten worse since he had last been in the Halfworlders’ grasps. Their intentions had been obvious since the implant of the tracking chip, they had been awaiting this opportunity for a long time, and revenge was finally within their reach.  
He heard his heart begin to pound loudly in his ears as his breathing picked up pace, all thoughts of the painful bruise forming of the torn stitches in his neck dashed as panic and adrenaline began to sweep his system.  
He had to get out of there. He had to escape. There was that word again, ‘escape,’ a phrase that he simply couldn’t seem to shake. Escape from Halfworld. Escape from prison. Escape his nightmares. And the irony of it all made him want to laugh out loud, because if he had learned one thing in his lifetime, it was that there was no escape.  
Wherever he went, his past seemed to follow. Whether it be in his night terrors, those blasted panic attacks, or the scientists themselves showing up once again to cut him open and take him apart like some child’s toy, he had never really managed to escape.  
And now, as proof of his prolonged failure, he was about to be subjected to that torture again, as though nothing had ever changed, as though everything with Groot, with the guardians, had all been some deranged dream that his unstable mind had created.  
The doors at the end of the hall drew closer and Rocket’s panicked breathing had only gotten worse, his body curling in on itself, his tail wrapping around his small body as he was brought closer and closer.  
Another tear rolled off of his dampened fun and onto the floor and a whimper escaped his lips. It was sickening really. The thought that after how much effort he had put into building a new life for himself, Rocket could do nothing but shiver and cry as he was unwillingly dragged back into the reality he feared most.  
And it was exactly those cynical thoughts that had thrown him to act. The moment the man’s hand reached out to grasp the handle of the door, Rocket’s sharp claws were drawn again, scraping the arm in front of him before reaching back to scrape into the one holding his neck, knowing that this time, he had caught the man off guard.  
The scientist let out an angered growl before rearing back, his clutch loosening ever so slightly. And that was all that Rocket needed before wrenching himself around, ignoring the pain as more stitches tore open, and biting straight through the white lab coat.  
He was dropped instantly, landing with a sickening smack as he hit the floor. Rocket launched himself to his feet, scrambling away madly as the man reached to grab him again, making sure to keep himself facing the man as he backed away lest he make a grab for his tail again.  
His mind was racing so fast that he had hardly registered the fact that the man had already called for back up until he heard the sounds of running feet growing louder as they raced down the hallways of the ship towards him. He had to act fast.  
The raccoon turned to run, about to take off down a set of hallways and into the maze of a ship when he was stopped in his tracks as something forced itself around his already aching neck. A choked cough racked his body as he was jerked back off of his feet, lifting his hands to feel at whatever it was that was now choking him.  
The collar itself wasn’t the large electrocuting one that had rendered him unconscious before back on the Milano, but it was a collar nonetheless and the more the man on the other end pulled at it, the tighter it became, much like the metallic leashes used by the animal control forces back on Xandar had used, luckily Groot had been there to turn away the offenders at that point.  
But his protective friend wasn’t here to wrangle the leash from the man’s hold and give Rocket the chance to charge his latest weapon. No, this time he was being dragged choking and writhing at the end of the collar, struggling to loosen the coil around his throat and fighting for air.  
His thrashing had yet to cease as the scientists pulled him back through the long white hallway and towards the dreaded door, and when it was finally pushed open, the raccoon had all but froze, only allowing more tears to fall as he was brought to the table lined with wires and sparking plugs.


End file.
